


Moonbat Conspiracy Theory Love Story

by Elti



Category: Political RPF - US 21st c.
Genre: Conspiracy Theories, M/M, otp: wait that's my word
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-08
Updated: 2020-11-15
Packaged: 2021-02-25 23:47:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 27,442
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21724000
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elti/pseuds/Elti
Summary: Twitter is full of lunatics with roses and check marks next to their handles. This is the heartwarming romance on a dark sci-fi background I got when I put together a bunch of their insane conspiracy theories. Starring a very special FBI agent who only signed up to have his student loans forgiven and a lab-grown intelligence analyst/Parks and Rec character who has no idea what to do with his arms. Make this your risky click of the day!
Relationships: Chasten Buttigieg/Pete Buttigieg
Comments: 63
Kudos: 72





	1. File 00 - The Stage Is Set

**Chicago Regional Training Facility - June 16th, 2015**

The door handle clicked.

"Agent Glezman, Director Lindquist will see you now."

Chasten had been surprised to be called into work on a weekend. He was on light duty for another month, teaching full time while he waited for his arm to heal. His last assignment had been… rough, to put it mildly, and he hadn’t expected another long term investigation until the fall.

More surprising when he entered the office were the inhabitants. Besides his old mentor, Jim Lindquist, a woman in a sharp leather jacket and a man in camo fatigues occupied the conference room table. Chasten didn’t recognize either of them.

“Special Agent Chasten Glezman, this is Dr. Julianna Moore of DARPA and Colonel Devan Smith, US Army. We’ve been reviewing your last assignment, and they’d like to ask you a few questions. Chasten, pull up a seat.”

Colonel Smith got them started. “Agent Glezman, you’re the only survivor from the Nevada black site. Why did he spare you when he slaughtered everyone else?” Well, no softballs to start them off.

“I wasn’t really part of the detainment program. I was just there to evaluate the children, to see if it was possible for them to recover and integrate into society. I wasn’t really one of the jailers.”

“Subject 014 wasn’t one of the children, and none of the other detainees or medical personnel evaluating the children were jailers, either. Why did he spare you?”

“… He was obsessed, and I wouldn’t characterize what he did as sparing me.” Chasten could still feel the bones in his wrists grinding together, sometimes.

Dr. Moore straightened in her chair, and joined the conversation. Her eyes were just as sharp as her jacket. “Agent Glezman, that doesn’t really answer the question.”

“He’d had everything human cut out of him, except for training and base animal instincts. He thought killing the children was mercy, as much as he understood the concept. It’s not for me to speculate.”

“What about the children? I know you didn’t get the chance to finish your evaluation, but given what you know, do you think they could have become responsible members of society?”

“With proper care, yes. At the end of the day, they were still human. Sharper and stronger than normal, but still human. Where is this going?”

“It came to our attention last year that one of the children from the 1993 escape at the Hawkins facility survived. We’ve been watching him since, and although he seems stable, we all know how that’s turned out so far. He’s a public figure, so it’s been difficult to inject someone into his life discreetly. This morning he came out of the closet, and our intelligence indicates he intends to start dating. This is a golden opportunity for long term, in-person surveillance.”

Jim flipped open the file folder resting on top of the pile at the center of the table, and pushed it across the surface to Chasten. The man in the picture clipped to the folder could have been Subject 014’s identical twin.


	2. File 01 - The Most Interesting Mayor You've Never Heard Of

**O’Hare Airport, Gate E5 – July 17 th, 2015**

When Chasten Glezman signed himself over to the FBI, he expected boredom and bureaucracy mixed with occasional moments of terror. He did not expect to be trading perfectly-spelled, perfectly-punctuated _Game of Thrones_ chats on a dating app with a lab-designed killing machine who happened to be the sitting mayor of the city of South Bend, Indiana.

Peter Buttigieg had finally taken the bait and sent Chasten a message on Hinge, thanks to manipulation of their Facebook algorithm placing Chasten on top of his list of possible matches. Program PERFECTMATCH had started out as a THINTHREAD analyst’s over-caffeinated side project. It had evolved over time into one of the best ways to inject operatives into a target’s inner circle. Usually, the target’s dating history was used to narrow down a roster of suitable agents. In this case, Subject 014’s fascination and Chasten’s own expertise were taken as suitability enough.

The friend who helped the mayor pick out dating profile pictures clearly had taste. A thirst trap in uniform, one well-lit beach photo with an appropriately-soaked t-shirt, and just about the best podium shot a politician could use to allow the viewer to glean his day job without being too obvious about it. He had a gentle smile and intense blue eyes, a combination of traits Chasten absolutely wanted in a real-life match, but might well be a cover here. Subject 014 had been a monster shaped by a vile, empty life, and this man likely had his roots on the very same lab bench.

Buttigieg’s other social media accounts were more wholesome than steamy, the Facebook and Twitter profiles of a public servant at work rather than a man looking for romance. He appeared to love kids, dogs, and infrastructure projects. He frequently invited angry constituents to come meet him in person at something called ‘Mayor’s Night Out’. What he lacked in fashion sense he made up for with an overdeveloped sense of civic duty. In most of the pictures where he was wearing a t-shirt, it declared his allegiance to either the Navy or the city he lead. He appeared to be more than a little bit of a nerd.

Overall, the agent’s first impression was that his target must be the love child of Leslie Knope and Ben Wyatt rather than a bunch of mad scientists’ idea of the future of warfare.

**FBI Field Office, Chicago – August 15 th, 2015**

Weeks into their long distance Facetime conversations, it disturbed Chasten that Buttigieg was so much more attentive to him than any of his actual partners, in his personal life and with the FBI. He wanted to know every detail of Chasten’s life, from his favorite wine to to his favorite music to what made his heart beat faster, and he remembered every detail from day to day. Usually it was easy to get a target to spill their secrets to a love interest, this target just wanted to talk about everyone else.

They’d quickly exhausted the superficial topics, forcing Chasten to fall back on real stories from his life, his own passions, slightly adulterated for his audience. The irony of describing FBI agents as middle school students was that the blond would rather be teaching teenagers, it just didn’t pay well enough to keep up with his staggering loans and have a decent place to live. Chasten was currently staying in a safe house apartment dressed up like an independent college student’s abode that was still nicer than the rat trap he had been subletting when he was actually substitute teaching. So Agent Jones became David, Agent Larsen became Karen, Agent Jackson became Imani. It helped that the dinosaur skits remained the same, one way to humble the hotshots and get them all to pay attention on the first day of class.

The mayor had been so fascinated by Chasten’s career that he’d eventually shared his first real exposure to teaching as anything other than a student, the experience of helping autistic kids pull themselves out of their own shells at First Stage in Milwaukee, experience that had been vital when dealing with the children in Nevada. It helped that the brunette seemed just as interested in the welfare of the children as he was truly, honestly fascinated by Chasten. That single-minded focus would be flattering coming from a potential love interest over the phone. What must it be like in person?

Thankfully, the one thing he didn’t seem to want to know was his match’s own romantic history. Short and ugly as it was, it was the singular topic Chasten wasn’t sure how to gloss over or fill in details from a cover story. He wasn’t looking for love at this point, just peace, and that might make a man wonder why on earth he was cruising for dates on Hinge. Buttigieg had danced around it awkwardly, partly because he didn’t appear to have any romantic history of his own. When he’d been in the closet, he’d apparently been well and truly in the closet: no secret rendezvous, no secret dating, maybe even no one who knew what was going on with him at all. His reason for being on Hinge was clear enough: he was lonely.

The call today was also the first time family had come up in their discussions, another topic Chasten tried to avoid but had an easier time deflecting than when talking about dating. His target displayed a quiet but powerful affection for the couple who had taken him in as a child. They all lived in the same neighborhood and apparently kept in close, regular contact. One of the goals of ingratiating himself to Peter was to be invited into the home of Joseph Buttigieg and Anne Montgomery, to see how they interacted with the target and take time to investigate their residence, where they had moved just before the 1993 escape. How did his “parents” feel about this changeling who had replaced their own natural born son? Had his extended family scattered around the world noticed? The disappearance of that original child and how an experiment from Hawkins had come to replace him were mysteries unlikely to be solved by arranging dates with an FBI agent, unless the agent’s superiors were playing a much longer game than he suspected, but it might open up some new leads.

It was pathetic, but the agent’s Facetime dates with the object of his investigation, sometimes sharing a beer and watching a movie together over the phone and sometimes just talking, were plugging the same gaping holes in Chasten’s personal life that Chasten was plugging in his target’s, even as he struggled not to give too much away. Chasten had lost friends when his last, disastrous relationship had fallen apart. He had gone to Nevada for a fresh start, or at least a break, and that had gone even worse. Fishing for information for the federal government should not have been an improvement.

**FBI Field Office, Chicago – August 24 th, 2015**

Two months after their initial meeting and a month after starting up his online chatter with the mayor of South Bend, Chasten found himself sitting at another conference room table with Director Lindquist, Colonel Smith, and Dr. Moore, to touch base on the investigation as it stood and discuss the upcoming real, in-person date. Smith and Moore’s people had been following their own leads regarding the Hawkins project while Chasten plied their target for his innermost thoughts on the latest episode of _Parks and Recreation_.

“Dr. Moore, why don’t you get us started?”

“Certainly, Director. We’ve been able to confirm that the man we know as Peter Buttigieg is indeed Subject 013, and not the original template or the other missing augment. We were able to find several pictures where he isn’t wearing a watch, and there’s discoloration where the tag would be. The scarring visible above the collar in some pictures is also consistent with records of 013.

“013 was one of twenty original test subjects in Hawkins, and one of four subjects to escape the facility in 1993. The bodies of Subjects 004 and 017 were located the following summer, however Subject 012 remains unaccounted for. Documents recovered from the Hawkins facility and Nevada site, along with testimony from the handful of former Hawkins project personnel in lockdown at Area 51, indicate that the escapees had at best limited physical modifications, besides what’s encoded in their DNA.”

Moore, it had turned out, was an old hand at DARPA who had known many of the Hawkins scientists for years. Some were colleagues and some were friends, but all of the senior technical experts were familiar to her. She disagreed with what they’d done, thought they had gone so far off the reservation that there was no coming back, but they were all people to her and it was difficult to think of people you had respected as being capable of the kinds of things that had been done at Hawkins. Whether it was fair or intentional, it colored how she thought of the survivors.

“Thank you, Dr. Moore. That leads us to one of the other loose ends: how they escaped in the first place. Colonel Smith?”

“The four taken were likely recovered from the labs, not the holding cells where they were usually kept. Standard procedure at the Hawkins facility was to drug or restrain subjects in the labs.” The disgust was clear in Smith’s voice. The Colonel had been among the soldiers who had located and cleared out the Hawkins facility in 2013. The blank-eyed children who had been pulled from the cages there would never be just notes in a file to him.

“These kids were likely in no shape for an escape, if the records we do have and the survivors at the Nevada site are any indication. Anyone who got out of that hellhole would have required significant support to adapt to life out in public – basic socialization, eating solid food, that not all of the adults around them wanted to hurt them.

“The monsters who ran the Hawkins facility did everything possible to isolate their victims. That first round of kids really were nothing more than biology experiments to them. It was deliberate on their part to dehumanize their test subjects to both the scientists using them as guinea pigs and to themselves. It’s tough to mount an escape if you don’t know that there’s anywhere else you could go. Even the handful of adult survivors couldn’t read English or a map, hadn’t ever eaten anything except for some protein sludge, hadn’t had a healthy relationship in their lives -”

Here the Colonel cut himself off and instead flipped through old photographs of the likely route to freedom in 1993: the labs, less isolated and with fewer restraints than when the facility was finally decommissioned twenty years later, the small break room used by security personnel, and the old wine cellar that had served as a fire escape and since been boarded up. His agitation was finally showing on his face.

“The two bodies we found, Subject 004 and Subject 017, were wearing civilian clothing. One of the girls even had a backpack with a stuffed animal and art supplies. Someone was taking care of them, we just don’t know who or why. We do know the professors acquired Subject 013 sometime between December of 1993 and March of 1994, and that by the time they sent him to school in August they’d turned an illiterate lab rat into an honor student who got along with everyone. Since then, we haven’t found any evidence of contact with Hawkins or associated projects, and 013’s only visible military ties are through Professor Montgomery’s family and his own service in the Navy Reserve.”

Dr. Moore flipped around her laptop, apparently eager to change the subject. The screen was displaying stills of Chasten’s first Facetime chat with Buttigieg. “He’s definitely recovering from an injury, but it’s not a herniated lumbar disc like he implied, and it’s not listed in his Navy jacket. Given the way he’s positioning his arms, something is limiting his range of motion. Still, any pain he’s feeling doesn’t appear to be slowing him down much. We should send backup prepared to incapacitate him.”

That answered the question of why the brunette had moved stiffly on the screen of his phone. He claimed it was due to surgery to deal with a hernia induced by an overly-enthusiastic weight lifting regimen. Chasten had wondered if it even possible for someone like him to develop a herniated disc, and what kind of repeated force it would take. It also opened up the question of why, exactly, would they be incapacitating their target? They’d only even known Buttigieg existed for the past year, and so far he hadn’t exactly proven himself a threat to humanity. Chasten had been on some spectacularly bad dates, but this one was going to stay in public with a public official. There was no reason for his target to finger his date as a g-man, and certainly no reason for him to make a scene in a restaurant where many of the patrons likely already knew him.

Jim Lindquist turned off the projector and turned to face his subordinate. “The bottom line is we need to know if Subject 013 really is a free man, or if he’s still being controlled by a branch of the Hawkins project we don’t know about. We’d eventually like to know the same about Subject 012. Agent Glezman, you’ve arranged a meeting?”

Chasten may be planning on driving to Indiana for an arranged romance, but he wouldn’t be calling his date anything but his name. The other survivors had died as numbers. Whatever kind of person Peter Buttigieg wound up being, he deserved that much.

“Yes, sir. I informed Buttigieg that I plan to travel to see family in Michigan next weekend, before the school year starts. I offered to swing by South Bend on my way north on Friday the 28th, and he accepted. I’ll be driving a fleet vehicle equipped with surveillance to the target’s home, meeting him for pickup at 1200 local time. I’ve offered to shuttle him around town with the excuse of his back injury.

“He suggested we go to a local coffee shop for lunch. Based on his credit card statements, which admittedly show he eats everywhere, and his description of the menu, he likely intends for us to stop at Chicory Cafe, a local cajun restaurant. We’ll be accompanied by a surveillance detail, who plan to arrive at the target location at 1000 local time. The complete surveillance plan is at the back of the packet, sir.”

“Good. This is essentially just a meet and greet, but it’s also a good opportunity to spot details that are sometimes missed on background. Dismissed.”

**South Bend, Indiana – August 28 th, 2015**

Chasten pulled up in front of the spacious, white colonial four hours behind schedule, thanks to the unfortunate combination of a snafu with the mics in the car and Chicago traffic. The house, like the city it was in, had clearly seen better days but had someone putting serious elbow grease into its restoration. Maybe it was the effect of growing up in a family with a significant stake in landscaping, but Chasten thought the bed of tulips looked like it could use a little work.

He steeled himself as he exited the car. This was what all of that theater training was for these days: pretending to be eager to go out on a date with someone with kind eyes and a terrifying background. He plastered a smile on his face, marched his way up the picturesque front porch, and knocked on the door. It swung open immediately, Buttigieg on the other side. He must have been waiting.

“Howdy!”/”Howdy!”

Was that an echo? “Wait, that’s my word!”

“Not today, apparently. Nice to finally meet you, and welcome to South Bend!”

“Chasten Glezman, in the flesh.”

Between the classic fixer-upper on the river and the shared greeting, this was starting to feel entirely too much like a gross rom com meet cute. Buttigieg was pretty cute himself, with his slightly baggy, ill-fitting polo and jeans distracting from a compact physique. His thick brown mop of hair was slightly unkempt in person, and he had a bit of baby fat on his face that Subject 014 lacked. It made him look younger. He was exactly the kind of guy Chasten would normally go for, if not for the triple-whammy of him being a politician who happened to be both a lab-grown killing machine and Chasten’s assignment.

Buttigieg held the door open for his guest. “Come on in. You’ve had a long drive, need to use the restroom or anything before we head out?”

After the disaster of the wiring in the car and three hours of Chicago drivers being their usual charming selves, the operative could absolutely use a trip to the restroom. Some of that desperation must have shown on his face, because Buttigieg quickly gestured Chasten down the hall to a bathroom. Once he was finished and his hands clean, the blond used the opportunity to observe the home in person.

The atmosphere of the place was that of an absent-minded professor’s den, with books, papers, and what appeared to be sheet music scattered about every available surface. The inside of the house, like the outside, had clearly required a great deal of work from someone who had learned on the job. Everything was clean but disorganized, with no color coordination evident on the premise. The kitchen was a blinding shade of yellow. It was nothing the managers of the Hawkins facility would have ever stood for.

When Chasten got back to the entryway, Buttigieg was waiting for him with his shoes on, ready to go. “So, since we’re running a bit behind, how do you feel about stopping for a pint instead of coffee? There’s a great Irish pub downtown, it’s just a short walk.”

It wasn’t in the plan for the stakeout crew, but some grease and a beer sounded pretty great under the circumstances, and they were set up for some flexibility. Members of the surveillance team planned to move in and install mics and cameras in every nook and cranny while they were away, and subbing a real dinner in place of coffee might give them some extra time. “Yeah, I think I’d be up for that. I could use something solid in my stomach, too.”

Buttigieg brightened. “Great, just let me lock up and we’ll head out!”

His date lead him on a slightly indirect route to their dinner destination, closer to the river than the main drag. As they crossed Michigan Street, the agent gestured to the van parked down the block, confirmation to the surveillance team that they were heading out in case there were issues with the audio feed. The brunette peppered him for updates since their last conversation as they trekked south, asking how his week had gone and how he was preparing for the upcoming school year, and the students he wouldn’t actually have.

The downtown core of South Bend had a lot in common with the neighborhoods the agent had driven through on his way into town: a mixture of abandoned lots and classic architecture under restoration, surrounded on all sides by road construction. His date held open the heavy wooden door for him when they arrived at the pub, either no longer troubled by the back injury or just that eager to be helpful. Fiddler’s Hearth was just as cozy inside as it was on the outside, with patrons gathered around their drinks at thick wooden tables and memorabilia decorating every available inch of space on the walls.

The best covers had their roots in the truth, so over dinner Chasten played hard to get the same way he would if he really were dipping his toes back in the dating pool. He interrogated Buttigieg on his interests (public service, James Joyce), career goals (he was running for reelection in the fall, and considering running for governor in a few years), and personal goals (he wanted marriage, kids eventually, a family to come home to). Chasten poked for details that might not have come up in their research, possible angles to investigate, and didn’t get much. The brunette’s last date had been more than a decade ago, and he hadn’t had much of a personal life since, besides the few close-knit friendships they already knew about. Queries into his professional life didn’t yield much new information, either.

Two hours into the agent’s interrogation, fish and chips platter practically licked clean, Buttigieg piped up, “Everything on the menu’s good, but I think the scotch eggs are the real winner here. Interested in splitting one?” Chasten nodded, up for something a bit more substantial. His last real date, in all ways a disappointment, had spied his paunch and pointed him to a salad. Today’s paramour, however inexperienced, was a bit better at reading the room.

The scotch egg, when it arrived, smelled even more amazing than it looked. His heart fluttered in anticipation of that greasy, delicious calorie bomb. The surest way to a Midwesterner’s heart was through his stomach, and at this point the mayor was one step shy from handing Chasten the ranch. The brunette passed him a fork, and they came at the sausage-wrapped artery clogger from both sides. He was really going in for the kill. This was shaping up to be the Midwestern foodie version of that Lady and the Tramp scene, minus the public kiss.

“I, ah, don’t want to overstep, but it’s a beautiful day, and I have tickets to the Cubs game in twenty minutes or so. They’re our local minor league team. It’s just a few blocks’ walk, and I thought if this went well, you might be interested in going with me. And, I think it is going well?” The bashfulness was endearing. It _was_ going well, and it would be even if the agent hadn’t been looking for excuses to stay close.

“I’d love that, Peter. Let’s close out the tab and go for a walk.” People around the pub had been sneaking discreet glances all evening, after a few of the more observant patrons had realized their mayor was out on a date, possibly his very first one out in public in South Bend. Some fresh air would be nice. Amy, their waitress, had clearly been among the onlookers, because even in the busy restaurant she had their bill ready before Buttigieg could finish raising his hand. The mayor insisted on paying. Chasten gave his quarry points for being a good tipper, and took them right back for his absolutely appalling left-handed chicken scratch.

The ballpark was a convenient walk away, just a few short blocks southwest of the pub, and the South Bend Cubs game brought out every bit of cheesiness Chasten had come to expect from minor league baseball. There were giveaways, games for kids between innings, and the world’s unhealthiest nachos. He and his date got their picture with the mascot, a cuddlier version of the Chicago Cubs’ own representative. A vendor offered the mayor a beer on the house, and he was sharp enough to pay for Chasten’s before he could even reach for his wallet. Between the weather and a team with what was apparently an excellent record, attendance at the game was good, so Chasten didn’t get much private conversation in, but he did get to see the brunette interacting with his constituents.

It was still a shock to the agent that one of the subjects from the Hawkins project was now a public figure, especially a seemingly laid-back, well-liked one. ‘Mayor Pete’ was asked to take selfies with a collection of children, got pulled into a conversation about changes to garbage pickup, petted every dog he saw, and was yelled at by no fewer than three people about roundabouts. One of them held his finger right to Buttigieg’s chest throughout the whole tirade, something that would have lost him that finger if this had been Subject 014. By the end of the conversation, the man had calmed down and he and the object of his ire agreed to disagree about the traffic changes.

Around the fifth inning, Chasten decided he had seen enough. Buttigieg’s kind, level demeanor may well be far from all there was to him, but it was clearly real, between how he dealt with the people in his city and the way he treated his date. The agent may not have gotten any concrete leads, but part of getting an in with a target was learning what they loved, and for this particular target, that was his hometown and the people in it. It was time to ditch the elderly women in the row behind them, alternating between scoring the game and spying on their mayor’s date, and move the night toward its conclusion. “Peter, how about we head back? We can walk by the river and you can show me those lights you told me about earlier.”

The brutnette, comfortable as he apparently was being ambushed by locals day-in and day-out, seemed ready to get back to something approaching privacy. He orated the city’s 150th anniversary that summer as they walked toward the river lights, which were currently alternating between bright shades of purple, hometown pride evident in his voice as he described the way the city had come together for the celebration. Chasten could survive only so much recitation of civic virtue, it was time to kick things up a notch. The agent took a half step forward and slid his left hand into his target’s right. The brunette’s speech stuttered, clearly surprised, then he gripped Chasten’s hand as gently as he’d done everything else. He was blushing scarlet in the twilight.

They continued down the boardwalk toward where they’d started their date, hand in hand and sides brushing, while the brunette alternately peppered Chasten with questions and pointed out city landmarks. The sky suddenly lit up with fireworks, according to Buttigieg a sign of a South Bend Cubs victory. He was clearly not going to be making the first, second, or third move, here. Chasten tugged at his arm to get him to halt his pace and turn right to face him. He held his left hand up to Buttigieg’s five o-clock shadow, and leaned in to give him a short but firm kiss on the lips.

When Chasten leaned away, the brunette was blushing even harder, finally speechless. Chasten tugged his hand again to get him walking, with the mayor nipping at his heels, eyes on his date, like an amorous puppy. He was adorable.

When they got back to Chasten’s borrowed car on North Shore Drive, he gave Buttigieg one last peck on the cheek before heading out. “I had a great first date! Call me!”

In the rearview mirror on his way out, he could see Buttigieg’s grin as he cradled the cheek Chasten had kissed.

**Truck stop off of I-80, Indiana – August 29 th, 2015**

Chasten pulled up next to the surveillance van at their appointed rendezvous, just outside of South Bend proper. It would have been nice to grab a hotel in town, given the late hour, but if Chasten was going to become a fixture in the life of one of the area’s most recognizable residents, they had decided it would be best not to take the chance on whether or not he would be remembered. The team had decided to regroup at one of the many pit stops along the tollway before heading back to Chicago. He shut off the engine, levered himself out of the car and went over to knock on the back door of the van.

Of the three agents who made up the surveillance team, Ramirez was the one who opened the door. He was a former student of Chasten, too, although not one who had been transformed into a teenager for anecdotes on Hinge. “Hey, Glezman, you finally made it! Everything we planted in the house looks good, so we’re going to pack up shop soon and head out. Daniels is hitting the can, Khan’s wrapping up her notes up front, and those SWAT guys are already on their way back to Chicago. It looks like the mayor’s about to hit the hay, too. He just got off the phone with someone called ‘Nat’, if you want to check it out.”

Chasten was ready for bed himself, but he wouldn’t mind listening in on the aftermath of the evening from his target’s point of view, especially while it was all still fresh. ‘Nat’ was likely to be Nathaniel Myers, the friend from college they suspected was a case agent in Africa. Buttigieg and Myers had been unaccounted for in Somaliland for several days in 2008. “Thanks, Ramirez, I’d like that.”

“Sure thing, I’m going to go use the restroom, too. And I know you can’t tell us why we’re setting up spy dates with the mayor of South Bend, Indiana, but I just want you to know we’re all dying to know.”

“Hah, you wouldn’t believe me if I told you. Let me know when you’re ready to roll.”

“Well, make yourself at home, then.” Ramirez handed his headphones over to the blond and scooted over the mouse and keyboard.

Chasten found what he was looking for on the kitchen feed. The angle wasn’t perfect, but he could tell that Buttigieg was curled around a mug of something at the kitchen counter, still blushing as he described their date to Myers over the phone. He went into exhaustive detail, from the moment he and Chasten said “howdy!” to each other to the moment they said goodbye. The two experiences he focused the greatest attention on were surprising: the first time the brunette saw his date smile in person, and holding hands while they watched the fireworks. Subject 014 had alternated between empty dissociation and animal rage, he hadn’t the emotional capacity to care about those small details. Buttigieg had been… sweet.

Subject 013 had been free for twenty-two years. Maybe, just maybe, Peter was the kind of guy who was worth a second date.


	3. File 02 - Going Steady

**Chicago, Illinois – September 6 th, 2015**

On their second date, Chasten and Buttigieg – Peter – finally wound up getting that coffee. The brunette had done the driving this time, making the trek to Chicago after attending the early morning service. This was another surprise, under the circumstances: his target was a regular at the Episcopal cathedral in downtown South Bend. He was still wearing his suit when he retrieved the agent from his safe house apartment. The suit, like his outfit the previous week, was a bit too big on him, but he wore the oxford and tie handsomely.

It was the blond’s turn to plan their day, and he’d decided to start with an activity his partner probably would not have planned on his own at this point: brunch at a gay hangout. It was clear between their evening together in South Bend and the geographic range he’d set on his dating profiles that Peter felt the weight of his visibility on top of his hometown’s small dating pool. Any man he might ask out on a date in South Bend was a constituent, making the transition from ally to out member of the community that much more awkward and intimidating. Chasten planned to kill two birds with one stone: keep a watchful eye on his target and make the man feel just a bit more welcome in the community he joined when he wrote that op-ed in the _South Bend Tribune_.

They wound up at a low-key establishment just north of the Chicago River, chosen in part for its bottomless mimosas. Bottomless mimosas were an integral part of the experience. Besides, the agent was going to enjoy drinking on the job and on the government’s dime while he had the opportunity. Just as on their first rendezvous, Peter went straight for the dish on the menu with the highest caloric density: the house hash platter with extra sausage, gouda cheese sauce on top, and a large cinnamon roll on the side. He washed it all down with several black coffees, the heathen.

Over his cocktail, the agent prompted his target for details of his time in Chicago, where he had lived for the majority of his tenure at McKinsey & Company. A junior analyst at the firm would have had much more involvement in pivot table formatting than any real customer handling, but enough of those customers were part of the national security establishment that it was a possible in for any surviving Hawkins project splinters. The brunette, however, didn’t have much to say about his time there beyond an intense focus on spreadsheets and his gratitude that the job had been what finally allowed him to move home. This was followed by a rambling story about a carriage house with a bee infestation he had moved into as soon as he relocated to South Bend. It turned out he didn’t have much to say about Chicago in general: he had spent most of his time in the city either working or with the family he’d rented from. He hadn’t done much exploring. All roads lead back to South Bend, Indiana.

As they had wrapped up their meals, Chasten prodded Peter into a walk through nearby Millennium Park. They parked themselves on a bench near the Cloud Gate sculpture, one of the many local landmarks Peter had skipped out on while living in the area. It was fertile ground for people-watching and striking up a conversation on a Sunday afternoon. More prompting into his time at McKinsey led Peter to a rambling story about a laptop he murdered with an Access database containing grocery store pricing data. Still no useful intelligence.

Standing up from the bench, Peter held out his hand for the blond to take while they continued their walk. Chasten hesitated. Holding hands in the dark on a quiet boardwalk in South Bend was one thing, doing it in the light of day in such a public place hadn’t always gone well for him. The delay in Chasten’s response must have signaled hesitation to his date, whose hand dropped awkwardly. He didn’t quite seem to know what to do with the rejection, after they’d walked hand in hand through town at their last meeting.

Then again, whatever had happened in the past, Chasten was presently out on a date with a man capable of folding a street sign like a pretzel. If he ever wanted to hold hands with his boyfriend in public with the assurance he would be completely safe doing so, today was the day. No way would anyone make trouble successfully. He stood and took Peter’s hand.

A pleased little grin joined the slight flush that had taken up residence on the brunette’s face. Chasten and Peter strolled through the park with their hands clasped and sides brushing, as they had along the St. Joseph River in August.

“So, I saw the Sleeping Bear Dunes t-shirt in your apartment. How do you feel about hiking?”

**The shore of Lake Michigan, Indiana – September 12 th, 2015**

Now confident that his target was unlikely to pull any unexpected moves, as well as in the surveillance team’s ability to adapt to a moving target, Chasten had allowed Peter to plan their third date. All the brunette had asked him to do was meet him at a specific spot at the border of Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore and the State Park, where parking wouldn’t be restricted after dark, and to pack along layers and a warm blanket.

Chasten arrived at Porter Beach just as the afternoon visitors were packing up their families and heading home for dinner. Peter was already in the parking lot, leaning up against his scruffy blue Taurus. A large backpack with two sizable thermoses strapped against either side was propped up by his legs. He waved at the blond, smiling, when he spotted him. Chasten’s date apparently saw more than just a quick evening hike with a stop for snacks in their future, with that gear.

The agent exited his car, the same FBI surveillance vehicle he had driven to their first meeting in South Bend, with his own much smaller and lighter backpack. “So am I allowed to know what we’re getting up to, yet, Mr. Mayor?”

The brunette flipped his pack onto his shoulders, where it looked even larger than it had on the ground. “I was thinking that we both enjoy a good hike, and tonight’s a new moon with clear skies in the forecast. So why not go for a walk along the lake shore and find a good place to set ourselves up to watch the sun set and the stars come out? I brought a bit of a late dinner for us to enjoy while we wait.”

Peter had a bit of spring in his step as he led them down to the beach and across to the neighboring state park’s trail system, enthusiasm overcoming what Chasten had come to know as a fairly reserved demeanor. The mayor, civic-minded individual that he was, reassured him that he had both state and national lands passes on his car when they crossed the border, so the relevant fees had been paid. They trekked up and down the dunes until they found the spot the brunette was looking for, walking side-by-side when the terrain allowed. As they hiked, the agent was once again faced with personal inquiries from his target instead of the other way around. If Agent Jackson ever found out he was using her improv skit to fill in an eighth grade cover story, she would have his head.

The spot in question, when they arrived, was a depression created by the shifting of the dunes, complete with a fallen tree to lean back against. It provided a small degree of privacy from onlookers while preserving an expansive view of Lake Michigan. Peter dropped his pack to the sand, and unfolded a large picnic blanket to the edge of the log. The blanket had shielded a candle and a basic set of camping crockery during their hike, which lay atop a cooler. The brunette lit the candle and assembled a small charcuterie plate from the depths of the cooler.

Next came one of the thermoses. Peter unscrewed the top and distributed the contents into the two enamelware mugs. He delivered one to Chasten, clinking their mugs together and stealing a peck on the cheek when he did so. The blond sniffed his mug, which turned out to contain a sweet dark wine, then averted his gaze to his companion’s eager face. South Bend’s very own Mayor Pete, so accomplished in everything else but inexperienced in this, appeared to be going all out despite his recent introduction to the realm of dating. He was outright courting Chasten, putting a focus on the romance that was truly flattering, and not something any of Chasten’s old paramours could lay claim to, not to this degree. This was a man who wanted to fall in love.

Chasten took a sip of the wine and returned Peter’s kiss, feeling the heat rising under the brunette’s skin as he did so. The blond shuffled his own blanket out of his backpack as he settled back to watch the sunset, sharing bits of cheese over the flickering candlelight with his date as they watched the sun set over the horizon. When the plate was empty, Peter shuffled over to the cooler again, and surfaced the finishing touch: two small tupperware dishes of decadent mousse. Chasten moaned when the first taste of it hit his tongue, savoring every bite.

Across the picnic spread, Peter was grinning into his mug of wine, clearly enjoying watching Chasten dig in. Well, that just wouldn’t do. The blond reached down for the candle to blow it out, making what they were up to a bit less obvious to the occasional beach-goer still meandering down the shore. He then took hold of the rim of Peter’s mug, wrested it from his grip, and set it aside as well. Chasten could see the flush rise up the brunette’s neck. He was finally starting to get with the picture, but didn’t seem to quite know what to do with himself.

Chasten nudged his left knee between Peter’s spread thighs and took his face in his hands, thick dark stubble brushing against his palms. He leaned in and pressed his lips firmly to his companion’s mouth, licking in so that the flavors of the dark chocolate concoction on his tongue mixing with the shiraz on his companion’s. Peter moved to cradle Chasten in return, deepening the kiss as he slid one arm around the blond’s lower back and cupped the other hand around the back of his head.

They broke apart, leaning parallel to each other against the trunk of the fallen tree while they caught their breath, when the brunette pitched in, “I don’t really know what I’m doing here, but I’d like to go steady. With you. I want to see more of you. Be exclusive?”

“Boyfriends, Peter. I like the sound of that.”

A light breeze was blowing in off of Lake Michigan, considerably cooler than when they had started out the evening. It had cleared the last of the clouds from the sky, a million points of light bright and unobstructed in every direction but for the orange glow of Chicago in the west. Peter wasn’t watching the heavens, though, when Chasten turned his head. His intense gaze was fixed on Chasten’s side, and he had closed the distance across the picnic blanket since the blond had directed his gaze skyward.

Chasten lifted his arm a bit in invitation. Once Peter had fit himself along the blond’s side, head pillowed on his shoulder, Chasten pulled the blanket over both of them. They tracked the progress of the stars across the moonless night like that, taking comfort in each others’ warmth, until the wind started coming in fierce and it was time for them to head home.

**Chicago, Illinois – October 10 th, 2015**

Four months into the investigation, and his contact with his target was now more along the lines of an assignation than an assignment. They now spoke every day, trading text messages while the sun was up and Facetiming each other in the evenings. They met every weekend, sometimes for more formal dates and sometimes to just hang out and do whatever looked interesting around town on the given day. Peter had taken to slipping notes into Chasten’s bag when they parted ways, along with a firm hug and a peck on the lips. It was an open question at this point what this was even accomplishing, besides creating what was at once both Chasten’s healthiest and least healthy romance to date. The agent didn’t know any more about the target’s contact with possible Hawkins offshoots, McKinsey conspiracies, or CIA ties than he had way back in June.

Today was one of their quieter engagements. Chasten had begged off their original plan to attend a concert in South Bend due to an exhausting week at work, which was true. Along with several other agents, he had spent his days digging into paper records from the original Hawkins facility, attempting to unravel decoded documents that, on their face, detailed an attempt to siphon funding for an expansion by fixing the price of mass-produced bread brands in a Toronto grocery chain. The Hawkins facility had actually been located, in a roundabout way, thanks to an inquiry from the RCMP regarding the bread-pricing scandal, making it one of their few concrete leads into the project’s financials. Between the long hours and the absurdity, the blond just wasn’t up for another fruitless trip to Indiana, however pleasant the company.

Instead, Peter had made the trip to Chicago himself, greeting Chasten at his apartment with the quick hug and peck on the cheek that had become their custom. He arrived bearing takeout and board games for an afternoon in. The mayor, as it happened, was just as competitive playing Risk as he was at everything else, but his composure didn’t benefit him to quite the degree it did during a game of poker. He was lucky Chasten was a bit distracted, himself. The brunette had started across the table from Chasten on one of the stools from the kitchen counter, but had migrated to the futon next to him during a break in play. The blond wasn’t used to his opponent being a comfortable warm line against his side as they traded jabs over the Kamchatka Peninsula.

Sometime during the process of Chasten’s armies evicting Peter from southeast Asia, it became clear this would not be the brunette’s game, and he switched up their conversation from tabletop trash talk. He rested his head on the agent’s shoulder, and spoke, “I know we haven’t known each other long, but I want you to know how serious this is to me. I want you to meet my parents, all the friends you haven’t met yet. I want to introduce you to my city, so they can come to know the man I do. I want to see you every day-”

Was this going to turn into an invitation to move in with him?! It would certainly help gain access to the locations the investigation required, but there was such a thing as taking undercover a step too far. Ten steps too far. The agent had to remind himself they weren’t really dating too many times already. So he leaned over to tap his lips to Peter’s forehead, moving down to kiss him firmly enough to steal the breath he needed to ask any questions.

Chasten kept the makeout session heavy enough that there was no room to ask questions, eventually slipping his hand into the brunette’s back pocket to massage the firm muscle beneath and eliciting a groan from his companion. He used the leverage to twist Peter over and tip them into a more comfortable position. The cushion was too narrow for two grown men to lay side-by-side comfortably, so the blond pulled his companion’s trim form against his side to keep him from toppling over onto the ground. Unfortunately, the dormitory-reject futon was far past its heyday of structural integrity, and it lurched to the side when Chasten attempted the maneuver, dumping Peter square onto his chest. The weight on top of him and the breath against his ear was too much-

“Chasten? Chas-”

The pressure was just too much-

Chasten came back to himself with Peter kneeling on the ground in front of him, below where Chasten was lying on the futon, cradling his hand. His grip was light, allowing the blond an escape if chose to take it. He was murmuring quietly, a low, calming white noise.

“Mariner, what of the deep?

“This of the deep:

“Solitude dwells not there, though silence reign;

“Mighty the brotherhood of loss and pain;

“There is communion past the need of speech,”

He circled his thumb over the back of the blond’s clammy hand, continuing his quiet mantra.

“There is a love no words of love can reach;

“Heavy the waves that superincumbent press,

“But as we labour here with constant stress,

“Hand doth hold out to hand not help alone,

“But the deep bliss of being fully known.”

The brunette rubbed his knuckles gently, grounding him until his heart no longer beat like a terrified rabbit’s. He kept up his recitation as he did so, his deep, tranquil voice lifting Chasten out of that place in his memories where he was trapped, word by word.

“There are no kindred like the kin of sorrow,

“There is no hope like theirs who fear no morrow.”

When he saw clarity return to Chasten’s eyes, he wrapped him in the blanket hanging over the back of the futon. He disappeared into the kitchen nook for a few minutes, and came back with a mug of warm tea, which he wrapped Chasten’s hands around. Peter sat himself again on the stool where he had begun the afternoon, that intense gaze directed at the blond’s knuckles, white with tension.

“Chasten, you said that a lot of bad things happened to you in the past year. I’m not asking you to say anything you’re not ready to, but I also don’t want to be just another person who’s hurt you. So please, if there’s a place you want to draw a line, tell me that much, and I’ll respect those boundaries.”

Chasten loosened one hand, and moved it to take one of Peter’s. He wasn’t ready to talk, not yet, it was all still too fresh. But he knew he was safe here and now.

**FBI Field Office, Chicago – October 12 th, 2015**

“You know, the SWAT team was about ten seconds away from breaking down that door on Saturday.” Jim set his coffee down, his gaze focused on his agent on the other side of the desk. Honestly, Chasten wasn’t sure if he was dealing with Jim, Director Lindquist, or some combination today. This meeting seemed to be part mission assessment, part off-the-record discussion with his mentor.

Chasten sighed and rested his eyes for a moment. “I’m glad they didn’t. Peter wasn’t doing anything wrong, he’s always been a perfect gentleman. It’s just that my last long term relationship ended with a restraining order for a reason, and sometimes that shows.”

“I don’t like digging into my agents’ personal lives, mostly because I genuinely believe it shouldn’t matter how all of you get along away from work, so long as you’re not hurting anyone. What happened with you made me reconsider whether I was making it more difficult for agents in who needed out of awful domestic situations to get the support they needed, if you felt that you wouldn’t get the help you needed here. The truth of the matter is I didn’t want to assign you this investigation, I wanted to give you more time.”

The blond didn’t know how to respond to that. When he’d finally gotten out of that apartment and the relationship that came with it for good, he’d had the support of friends who had known something was up and had been urging him to get out for months. They had provided a firewall around him while he got back on his feet. Connections from work had helped with the legal aspect on the down low. The embarrassment of him, a grown federal agent, being the victim in that situation had been what had lead him to take the Nevada assignment, to get himself away from those prying eyes. It was also very true that he had not wanted to be put into the position of stringing along the subject of an investigation, but then that particular subject had wound up being the one who finally bolstered Chasten’s self-esteem.

Jim sighed and topped off his coffee from the pot of caffeinated sludge behind the desk. “And then we have Mayor Buttigieg. Boot, edge, edge. You have no idea how many news clips I’ve watched, trying not to butcher that name.”

“Well, you have plenty of company, at least. I have personally witnessed him being referred to as ‘Mayor Pete’ without exception during the very serious coverage of a drive-by shooting. Most of his own constituents don’t use his last name.” Chasten had been flabbergasted, watching the evening news that day. It seemed as though sometime during the mayor’s first term, the city had collectively given up on a consistent pronunciation.

“I reviewed all of the reports you’ve submitted so far this morning. You believe Buttigieg isn’t connected to any remnants of the Hawkins project, that he is who he presents himself to be?”

“Broadly, yes. He has some suspicious personal ties, Myers and Schmuhl for instance, but they’re also the kind of people a sharp, ambitious person with his kind of skills might come to know over his life. His dedication to South Bend is another reason to doubt Hawkins’ interference. He’s too much a public figure for serious work as an operative, and if he were really their ticket to political power, he would have stayed in Massachusetts or Chicago and he’d probably still be in the closet. His path out of South Bend, politically, is too narrow for it to be a gamble on their part made with any sort of logic. He throws most of his energy into the city. It really is home to him, and I think it always will be.”

“The research team backs up the idea that there was no contact after 1993. Records are spotty, but it appears Hawkins personnel searched frantically through the discovery of the bodies of Subjects 004 and 017, and afterwards just decided it wasn’t worth the effort. Anything more than that is locked in the heads of the old guard locked up in 51, and they’re not talking. I suppose that brings us to one of our largest loose ends. You’ll be meeting the professors soon, correct?”

“Yes, I’m spending next weekend in South Bend. I’ll be canvassing with Peter for his re-election campaign on Saturday, then going to his parents’ house for lunch on Sunday. I’ve been told to bring my appetite.”

Chasten believed, and the other experts who had spent time at the Nevada black site before it had erupted into chaos concurred, that part of what had finally lead Subject 014 to snap was a general exhaustion on the part of the personnel responsible for reintegrating the Hawkins children into society. Among the most involved agents, the same kind of fatigue had set in that plagues long term caregivers, when dealing with someone else’s suffering day in and day out for months on end makes it difficult for you to bring yourself to smile sincerely. Subject 014, more familiar with the abuse of blank-eyed scientists than his younger brethren, had cataloged the slow slide of many Nevada personnel into the kind of apathy he knew growing up, and reacted to it.

A life of hyper vigilance and isolation hadn’t lead to the kind of experiences that would have allowed 014 to tell the difference between the demeanor of the monsters who had tortured him and people who wanted to help but were at the end of their collective rope in figuring out how. 014 hadn’t really had post-traumatic stress disorder, because for him the trauma hadn’t really ever come to an end. Chasten wanted very badly to meet the people who had, presumably, coaxed Subject 013 through all of that in secret without ever succumbing to despair themselves, and raised a fine man in the process.

“I trust your impressions of Mayor Buttigieg, but I’d like your evaluation of Mr. Buttigieg and Ms. Montgomery before we move on. As well as any intelligence you can glean from the home. So far you’ve avoided community events that could end with your picture in the news, but with election day coming up, that’s something you won’t be able to avoid for long.”

“There already is local press… awareness of me, I suppose you could say. I just haven’t been photographed yet. I’m starting to get recognized. If I’m involved in Peter’s re-election, I’ll be photographed. If I’m not around, it’ll look odd. I think we need to make a decision on the direction we’re heading by November, whether or not it’s worth me winding up in the paper as the mayor’s partner.”

“November, that doesn’t leave much time to make a determination.”

“No, no, it does not.”

“You more than just admire him, don’t you?”

That was definitely Jim asking, not Director Lindquist. Peter was a kind, patient man with romance in his soul, intense eyes, and a shapely ass. Chasten found him more than a little bit attractive, both emotionally and on a more carnal level, and that attraction intensified with every interaction. He wished they really had met through Hinge, and not through the machinations of the domestic security apparatus.

“Yes, I do. Very much so.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Although no expert on the topic of poetry, I have a fondness for Sarah Williams. The verse in the third section, the second of Deep-sea Soundings, was written by her. You may know her better as the author of The Old Astronomer to his Pupil.
> 
> I got the impression from interviews that these two crazy kids fell for each other hard and fast, but each had their own baggage to move past before they could really commit. So we’re slightly lighter on new conspiracy theories this go-around in favor of adding a bit more flesh to those already mentioned as well as the protagonists themselves.


	4. File 03 - Found Families

**South Bend, Indiana – October 17 th, 2015**

The weekend in South Bend that would determine the direction of the next leg of the Hawkins project investigation started off on the same foot as Chasten’s first meeting with Peter: with the enthusiastic consumption of a local delicacy. This time, the meal in question was barbecue, dished out at Frankie’s on Western Avenue. Frankie’s turned out to be the longest-running black-owned business in town, established 1968. It was also, as the proud mayor put it, “all about the sauce.” The brunette had rolled up his sleeves and tossed his tie over his shoulder before digging in with gusto.

The tips and fries were their first stop in a day that turned out to be a whirlwind of campaigning for the mayor’s reelection. Besides slathering his basket in sauce and catching up on what was new in Chasten’s life, Peter had shaken the hand of every patron of the establishment, caught up with them about their own lives and what they wanted out of the city, and encouraged them to vote. Also as with their first date, he’d been asked to have his picture taken with a handful of children and been on the receiving end of a solid rant about a traffic change.

Six hours later, with the sun slipping below the horizon and hundreds of doors knocked, the couple retreated to Peter’s home on the river. The day had reinforced all of the agent’s observations of the focus of the investigation as a mayor. Peter Buttigieg was completely dedicated to the well-being of his hometown and all of the people in it. The transplanted child had grown deep roots, and South Bend would always be home to him.

That transplanted child, now all grown up, was also an awkward, introverted nerd who was palpably in need of some alone time to recharge after a day of intense socialization. Peter had used his fridge, empty of the makings of a meal unless one counted condiments and a disreputable chunk of cheese, as an excuse to retrieve takeout from a restaurant far enough from home to drive to and earn himself a few minutes of solitude. For the agent he had left behind, this was a half an hour to snoop around the house while he ostensibly freshened up a bit and put away his things.

The living room was something of a haphazard library, with books, newspapers, and sheet music littering every surface – including the top of the baby grand by the bay windows – and bookshelves lining every wall. A thorough inspection of the contents of the living room would take more effort than one agent could muster in the span of a Chipotle run, and was covered well by the cameras besides, if his target decided to retrieve something hidden in the living room. Instead, Chasten decided to search some of the areas of the main floor not caught on camera that had been flagged as being of interest by the team reviewing the footage.

Peter’s gun collection was as antique as the safe that housed it, tucked into the corner of the room. There was no ammunition in the safe, and nothing hidden in its recesses save for a set of notes in flowing Arabic, likely details regarding the rifles on display. No surprises there.

The hall closet, frequently accessed by the owner of the home but simultaneously awkwardly placed for discreet monitoring, was another quick mark while Peter was away. It was also a bust: scruffy, unfashionable shoes and a bevy of shapeless coats that deserved nothing more than to be burned. The agent was pleased when he heard the back door scrape open, partly because all of that door-knocking had made him hungry, partly to spare him from more crimes of fashion. At this point, he was almost hoping to find a secret lair behind a bookcase to give the FBI an excuse to toss the place and make Peter’s unfortunate clothing choices disappear. The man was fit, he shouldn’t be hiding under such an ill-fitting wardrobe. Maybe the Hawkins project had engineered all of his sartorial instincts right out of him while they were dressing up his eyes.

Chasten had informed Peter that would get his things sorted and find them something to watch while he picked up their burritos, so he decided he should probably get on that before the man in question showed up in the living room, forks in hand. He selected a title from Peter’s small shelf of DVDs rather than cruising Netflix, to get a better idea of his tastes. Star Trek dominated the collection, slim cases decorated with the Starfleet insignia interspersed with the occasional drama. Some of the disks were clearly well-worn favorites. _Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home_ , notable for the sheer density of sci-fi tropes shoehorned into the script, had enough of the color on the cover worn off that it was likely among those favorites. Beyond that, it would be a safe, low-stress choice for both of them. Geeky enough for Peter, cheesy enough for Chasten.

Peter’s bright eyes softened when he turned the corner into the living room, meals and cutlery balanced in his hands, to see Chasten making himself at home on the couch, blanket stretched across the couch and movie ready to play. Effective bait for a lonely man. They settled in side by side under the blanket, digging into to their burrito bowls as the opening commercials rolled by on the screen.

Peter gradually slumped over on his side of the couch as the movie went on and dinner settled in his stomach, and by the time they were a quarter of the way through he looked about ready to tip over. Chasten lifted an arm in invitation and nudged his companion’s side to get him to look over. Peter, his face mashed up against the back of the couch, blinked up at Chasten through his eyelashes, bewildered. He didn’t look like he quite knew what to do with the invitation.

Chasten, needing some human contact himself, scooted over and tucked Peter against his side before he could resist or retreat. The brunette gave in, resting his head against the blond’s shoulder. Gingerly, he rested his arm around Chasten’s middle beneath the blankets, entwining their legs as Mr. Spock lectured Captain Kirk at the 80’s aquarium on screen. Slowly, he relaxed into the embrace, apparently about as used to being held like this as Chasten was to having someone to hold. By the end of the movie, he had gone completely boneless against the agent’s side, more of a warm, contented octopus than a fake mission boyfriend. His striking eyes were curved into satisfied little slits, just visible in the glow of the end credits.

“Up, Peter. It’s time for bed.” Loathe as Chasten was to move him, and to move himself for that matter, it really was getting late. It was as good a time as any to clean up and find an even warmer place to nestle up together. Chasten was ready to get one last cuddle in while he had the chance.

Peter pecked him on the cheek before decamping to the master bathroom to get ready for bed. Chasten listened to the water run and the door open and close from the guest bathroom down the hall. Peter was in and out in about five minutes, but Chasten’s routine was a bit more thorough. A mission was no reason not to moisturize, especially as summer turned to fall and the air dried out. He was honest enough to admit to himself that part of the reason he was taking his time was vanity. If they were going to share a bed, he was going to look good doing it.

The mayor had always been easy on the eyes, and the combination of soldier and scholar and the danger inherent to bedding his target only sharpened the physical attraction. That attraction was brought to the forefront when the blond entered Peter’s room after changing into his pajamas to see the brunette propped up against the pillows with a dog-eared book of poetry in hand, clad only in a thin t-shirt and a pair of cotton shorts for sleep. Food for the soul in hand, food for the libido on display.

His target looked up from his book when he heard the agent walk past the entryway, eyes brightening and a smile stretching across his face. He folded his softback over in one hand, and patted the empty side of the mattress in invitation. For all that this had long been the home of a solitary man, its owner was making space for a companion. The pillowcases on the open side of the bed were a bit brighter than those on Peter’s, newly purchased. The side table was in keeping with the style of the home, but it looked like one Chasten had spotted downstairs on his last visit, and it was outfitted with a different lamp and a place for Chasten to charge his phone. The way he made a place for Chasten was a facet of one of the traits the blond found attractive in Peter, his welcoming heart. It was also a sharp reminder of the fact of his existence that had made him an easy target, from the FBI’s perspective: he had been achingly lonely for a long time, and was willing to make sacrifices in his effort to change that.

Chasten grinned back at him, carefully placing his glasses on the newly relocated side table as he pulled down the thick comforter. He sorted himself under the warm coverings and then tugged at them a bit where Peter’s weight was holding them down. “Get under here, babe. It was freezing in that bathroom, and I need you down here with me to generate heat.”

Peter’s grin widened a bit, and he accepted the invitation, curling onto his side facing Chasten, their faces inches apart at the edge of the cocoon formed by the comforter. Chasten closed the distance, bumping their noses together before tilting his jaw towards Peter’s and meeting his lips in a slow kiss. Chasten cupped one hand around the back of Peter’s skull, pulling him closer and enjoying the scratch of the brunette’s stubble against his wrist. He chased that sensation with his mouth, deepening the kiss and tightening his grip on Peter.

They made out like that under the warm covers until Chasten’s stiffening penis had him seeking relief. When Chasten moved to grind his hips against Peter’s, the brunette flinched back.

“Chasten, are you sure? I don’t want to push you.”

“How about if I’m on top this time? No chance of slip-ups.”

There was a bit of longing darkening Peter’s eyes alongside the caution. He liked the idea of someone else driving. He liked the idea of Chasten in the driver’s seat. “How about that?”

Well, Chasten was happy to run with that. If he was only going to have one weekend before he had to let Peter go, he was going to make the most of it. He straddled his bed partner’s trim waist, rearranging the comforter over his shoulders as he did so. He could feel Peter’s erection hot and weighty against his thigh.

Chasten’s hands slipped under Peter’s t-shirt and up the firm, lean muscle of his flanks. The unyielding density of the musculature under his fingertips was a giveaway to the brunette’s origins. He slid one hand further up that hirsute chest to cup a hardened pectoral, circling his thumb over the aroused nipple. Peter gasped below him, the rosy hue of his cheeks darkening, and Chasten felt himself growing thicker in response. There was an incredible allure in having someone with the sheer physical power Peter possessed lying below him, yielding to him in this way, panting his arousal.

Chasten leaned over to nibble at one particularly edible-looking junction of Peter’s neck and collarbone, rubbing his erection against the brunette’s thigh as he did so, the pressure providing a measure of relief. It was an area that would just barely be masked by an open collar shirt, where the blond might be able to spot it the next day if he kept a careful eye out. In his ear, Peter’s breathing was once again growing harsher, and after one particularly ragged gasp, he shuddered and came between them. Chasten moved his mouth to cover Peter’s as he continued grinding down, chasing his own release to completion.

When he came to a moment later, he was lying atop Peter, the brunette’s hands slowly stroking down his lover’s sides, coaxing him slowly back to awareness. As he did so, he dropped soft kisses on the side of Chasten’s face that was accessible to him. Peter’s five o’clock shadow tickled his cheek when he moved. It had been a long time since the blond had felt this content.

It had taken Chasten most of the day to notice, focused on other things as he was, but Peter was being mindful of how he touched the blond, as observant of his body language as he was his words. The brunette was carefully telegraphing his movements so as to keep his companion secure in his own space over the course of their day together, after the fiasco the previous weekend. It was another example of just how twisted the situation had become for the agent: the first man he thought he might just be able to fall for after everything that had happened, who had maintained that kind consideration throughout their relationship, was his target. All at once, the officer of the law couldn’t wait for this assignment to end, and the man underneath the badge wished that a badge hadn’t been involved at all.

This was all wrong. He knew he was leading on a man who didn’t deserve it, who was thoughtful and brilliant and awkward and in his own way just as in need of caring as Chasten himself. Peter’s inexperience was in evidence as much as his respect and ardor for his companion. In his capacity as an FBI agent, Chasten was stealing away the first romance of someone who deserved better, even as he wanted him for his own. But the assignment wasn’t going to end just because it was becoming heart-wrenching.

And here he was, lying on top of his assignment, who was soothing him through the aftermath of his first orgasm after a long hiatus. Worse, he might just be responsible for that assignment’s first orgasm in the presence of another man. This was wrong. He pulled himself from their embrace, and scrambled off of the mattress. Visible for a brief moment in the mirror as he turned the corner was Peter, his eyes disoriented and his hands frozen reaching out. The agent beat a hasty retreat to the bathroom, slamming the door and parking himself on the edge of the tub with his head in his hands. He breathed deeply, attempting to collect himself. The only upside to this panic and indecision was that it would provide an easy excuse to break up with his boyfriend the following week. He clearly wasn’t ready for a relationship.

When Chasten returned to the bedroom, the brunette was curled up on his side, the light on his side of the bed turned off. Peter was just feigning sleep, too stiff to have truly nodded off. Chasten scooted across the mattress until he was sidled up to the mayor, chest against his companion’s back. Peter froze as the blond slid one arm under his and around his waist, relaxing when he realized Chasten was still awake and making a conscious decision. “This isn’t your fault, Peter.”

The brunette rested his hand over Chasten’s, entwining their fingers over his torso and gripping them tight. The contact scratched that long-standing itch again, between the warmth of their embrace and Peter’s steady presence.

Just one more day, Chasten could be selfish for one more day. He fell asleep like that, unsettled with the situation but content in the embrace in a way he hadn’t been in years.

**South Bend, Indiana – October 18 th, 2015**

Chasten drifted awake when Peter disentangled himself and exited the bed, but pretending to sleep as the brunette went through his morning routine and let himself out the door for the 8 am service. Being emotionally wrung-out from the night before didn’t change his job, and the agent was intent upon more unsupervised time to snoop around the house. Peter had left a note folded next to Chasten’s phone wishing him a good morning, and informing him the brunette was away at church and would return with breakfast.

Once the mayor was safely out the door, the agent levered himself out of bed, shrugged on a robe, and padded to a part of the house he hadn’t been able to explore properly the previous day: the office adjacent the master bedroom. If the living room had been something of a haphazard library, the study was a formal one, possessing a sense of order and organization lacking from the shelves downstairs. He aimed first for the desk, the most likely place to start his search and hopefully lay this investigation to rest, or something like it.

The surface of the desk, a restored antique like the rest of the house, was clean except for a notebook and writing implements. The writing inside wasn’t in any language Chasten understood – French? The Bureau should have hired the Babelfish to cover this man. Rifling through the top drawers proved fruitless, revealing utility bills and mortgage payments, knick knacks and office supplies, but nothing of particular interest. The larger bottom drawers showed a different story. A scruffy pile of receipts and post-it notes camouflaged the difference in size between the two drawers: the left-hand drawer was nearly three inches deeper than the right. A hidden compartment. Paydirt.

It took some fiddling to gain entry to the compartment, the access to which wound up being via a gap in the rear of the drawer. Inside the drawer was a handgun, a 256 GB laptop hard drive ensconced in thin anti-static material, a SATA cable to match the drive, and an envelope, reading “just in case” on the front in Peter’s familiar, nearly illegible hand. The handgun was a Beretta M9, a match for the sailor’s service weapon. Unlike the relics in the safe downstairs, it was loaded. The agent wished he had found the hard drive the day before; there wasn’t time to clone the disk for safekeeping before its owner returned.

The envelope wasn’t sealed, and contained two sheets of plain office paper. The first sheet was a just-in-case letter, transcribed with care in a clear attempt by Peter to clean up his inscrutable southpaw chicken scratch for his parents. Chasten carefully refolded it and returned it safely to its envelope. Some things deserved to remain private.

The second sheet was a list of accounts and computer passwords, again painstakingly lettered. All were accounts the Bureau already had knowledge of: his bank, utilities, mortgage company, personal e-mail. Also included was the contact information for key personnel in the mayor’s office, close friends, and fellow sailors. These were the people Peter wanted contacted if he died, some to take care of business, some who he just wanted to know. It was a relief to see no surprises there.

The clock above the desk showed half past nine, around the time Chasten would normally blearily lever himself out of bed when given the option. During their time together, the mayor had yet to successfully enter and exit a restaurant in South Bend without getting pulled aside by a constituent, but even Mayor Pete should be able to pick up takeout after church in a half hour or less. He would be home any minute. The agent packed up the desk and picked up a fresh set of clothing to clean up for the day.

Peter arrived home while Chasten was in the shower, if the scent of eggs and bacon was any indication. Chasten followed the aroma down the stairs to the kitchen table, where the brunette was perched over a cup of black coffee and a tablet. There were table settings for two: forks, napkins, and plates adorned with breakfast sandwiches and diced fruit. The empty place setting, Chasten’s seat, had a tall takeout cup in place of the touristy mug the brunette’s hand was curled around. When Chasten sampled the drink, it was a sweet milk chocolate mocha, rather than Peter’s usual dark roast.

Peter’s eyes raised to meet Chasten’s when the agent pulled out the chair to take his seat. It was a marvel to Chasten how some on the surveillance team considered their target unfeeling, almost robotic. Yes, Peter elevated self-possession to an art form, but his eyes were as revealing as his face was imperturbable: he was nervous, tremendously nervous. Peter was an old school romantic, but this kind of relationship was still foreign territory, and Chasten had thrown him, probably hurt him quite badly, the way he had cut and run to the bathroom the night before. He had no way of knowing that it was nothing he had done, that he had been perfect.

Chasten reached one palm across the table to cradle Peter’s free hand, holding his gaze across their meal. Chasten swallowed, steeling himself for a conversation he wasn’t quite ready to have, and beyond that wasn’t quite sure how to have honestly. He settled for telling a part of the truth. “Peter, I’m so sorry for what happened last night. I wanted, so very badly, to take you to bed last night, but I didn’t realize until we were in the heat of the moment that I wasn’t quite ready for that yet.”

Peter’s eyes were glistening in the morning sun. “I don’t want to hurt you. How do I tell when you’re not ready? When I should back off?”

“Oh, babe.” Chasten’s hand tightened over Peter’s. “It’s just going to take time. I know you’ll stop if I need you to.”

“Look—”

“Peter,” Chasten interrupted, “You’re already doing more than I thought anyone could. You respect my space, you watch how I react to every touch, and you’ve made me feel safe in ways I didn’t think I could anymore.”

“Chasten—”

“It’s just going to take time. We’ll talk, after we get back from your parents’. Now, this mocha’s great and these sandwiches smell amazing! Where’d you pick all of this up?”

“Ah, it’s from Chicory Cafe. It’s where I planned on taking you out for coffee on our first date, before Chicago traffic interfered.” Peter’s concern faded a bit, a slight smile stretching across his face.

“Well, then you’re just going to have to take me there another time.”

“I will. They have beignets and music. I’d have brought home a box of the beignets—you’ll love them—but this is just to tide us over until we get to mom and dad’s.”

Chasten gave Peter’s hand a reassuring pat and dug into his sandwich. It was as good as it looked, and it had just the right amount of grease to sate his hunger and calm his nerves while he readied himself mentally to meet his boyfriend’s parents for the first time. As upsetting as the circumstances were, the blond was less worried about meeting Anne and Joe than any previous partner’s parents; the agent didn’t have deep background from the FBI going into any other family brunches.

Peter lived less than a five minute walk from the professors. As they trekked down the block, he pointed out landmarks just has he had on their previous strolls together, but this time the landmarks were personal rather than civic: the place where Peter had skinned his knees and elbows learning to ride a bicycle, the corner where an ice cream truck stopped in the summer, and the neighbor with the best sprinklers for a group of children to run under on a hot day.

When they reached their destination, Peter let himself in, holding open the door for Chasten. “Mom, dad, we’re here!”

Anne Montgomery, white curls bouncing, greeted them past the door of the kitchen. She took a hold of Chasten’s hand, reaching out for a handshake, and pulled him in for a hug. “You must be Chasten! Our son’s been waxing philosophical about your smile for the past three months, so it’s wonderful to finally put a face to the name!”

“Oh, my goodness, it’s wonderful to meet you, too!

Anne then turned her attention to Peter, giving him a tight embrace of his own. “Peter, honey, your father’s out on the patio setting up. Give him a hand, please? Chasten, why don’t you follow him out there while I handle the drinks?”

Joe, when they met on the patio, was just as warm as Anne, with just as welcoming a hug. It was one thing to hear the warm affection in Peter’s voice when he talked about his parents, it was another entirely to experience them in person. There was love in every interaction between them, the kind of steadfast devotion that built a stronger foundation than any shouted declaration. In the time Chasten had known him, Peter had seemed confident wherever he went, if not in every situation. Here, the difference between confidence and comfort was on crystal clear display. Here, in this house, was the reason South Bend would always be home to Peter. Whatever conspiracy had lead them to meet, these three were a family, plain as day: mother, father, and son.

Like Peter, Joe and Anne were masters at turning around a conversation to the life story of the person they were talking to, and they wanted all the details on the man their son was so enamored with. The agent didn’t manage to turn the discussion back to Peter and their family until Peter himself left the room to clean up the kitchen. At that point, Joe started pulling out the family albums, handing one to Chasten to meander through while he told the story of a trip down South Bend’s East Race gone awry when Peter had been fourteen. He was definitely the catalyst for Peter’s repertoire of corny, middle-aged dad jokes.

As Chasten paged through the album, he was struck by just how clear the delineation was between the original Peter Buttigieg and the present one, despite the pictures in 1992 and 1993 being mixed together to provide camouflage. The first Peter was an active child, caught on camera playing t-ball, riding his bike, and running around the yard with friends. The second Peter, solemn as an owl in his earliest photographs, was more often depicted with the family dog than other people. As time went on, that tiny, stoic face grew into something more relaxed, more comfortable in his own skin, and Chasten started to see the man he had come to know in the child.

Another change as the years passed involved travel. From the beginning of the album to the early ‘90s, there were regular trips to a seaside oasis that could only be Malta, including a cavalcade of dark-haired relatives that must be Joe’s extended family. After the switch, there was a break of several years between pilgrimages to the Mediterranean. Why, the agent didn’t know. Joe and Anne could have been waiting for relatives’ memories of their first child to fade, they could have worried about capture, Peter himself may have been difficult to transport or to leave with a friend while the couple traveled, it was difficult to tell.

The most interesting snapshot, which seemed to confirm the idea that the family had no contact with the Hawkins project after the escape in 1993, had been taken during the first vacation in Malta after the switch, when Peter would have been fourteen. Another teenager, described as a cousin in the caption below the picture, had his arm thrown over Peter’s shoulders, the two of them laughing at something in the direction of the cameraman. The other teen had big sunglasses masking his eyes and darker skin, likely the result of months spent on a beach rather than the sunless winter proximity to the Great Lakes provided, but otherwise he was physically identical to Peter. He was not in the pictures from earlier trips, so he was either the result of an incredible coincidence, or he was the missing Subject 012, far from the custody of any government.

“If my ears don’t deceive me, Peter has gotten to the drying, so he must be just about done. We have an almond cake for dessert. Tea for you, Anne, to wash it down? Chasten, would you prefer coffee, tea, or something else?”

“Tea would be great, Joe.”

“Tea for me as well, please.”

“Two cups of tea, and another mug of coffee for Peter, because we all know he would not select anything else, given the opportunity. I will go and prepare the cake.”

Once Joe was out of earshot, Anne carefully folded her napkin and set it aside. Her earlier jovial mood had been wiped from her face.

“Peter doesn’t often share his struggles with us – the struggle he had coming to terms with himself, for instance. He doesn’t like to worry us, you see. He feels he shouldn’t be a bother and sweep his old parents into his troubles, even when we wish he would.” Anne cut herself off, and paused to examine Chasten. Anne had come across as a poised, considered woman over the course of the meal, who like Peter tended to speak in paragraphs once her mind was made up. It was a surprise to see her so clearly interrupt herself like this in his presence, when conversation so far had been relatively lighthearted.

But Anne steeled herself quickly, and continued, “Others in his life don’t have the same qualms, thankfully, when they feel the situation warrants intervention. You must understand that we find it concerning that the federal government is spying on our child, to the point where they have his home under surveillance and have injected an undercover agent into his life, into his bed. Agent Glezman, what are your intentions toward our son?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> While I consider the “Mr. & Mr. Smith” trope to be pretty hot under the right circumstances, it’s not exactly conducive to a strong, long-term relationship. Also, Pete and Chasten are both going through some things and could do with someone to talk to, so it’s best to just get the truth out there.
> 
> The delay between this chapter and the last was mostly due to my fairly limited free time being eaten by campaigning for Pete… So I took a week off, after, and came back to this chapter, about 50% of which was written the first week of January. Roughly 100% of my writing between then and now was garbled Skype messages about machines at work, so this has been a nice break. I plan on continuing as life allows with further chapters that don't have to be smoothed over after a two month hiatus.
> 
> Also, apparently someone read all of the dirty fanfic on this site where Chasten debauches his man and concluded that we think Pete's all about topping, so how's that for motivation? I'm pretty sure what Pete's all about is whatever Chasten wants.


	5. File 04 - Re-Pete

**FBI Field Office, Chicago – October 23 rd, 2015**

“My god, Chasten, reading the files was one thing, but seeing really is believing.”

A stout Hispanic woman with grey just beginning to dust her temples, Elena Magana had been a psychologist at the Nevada blacksite. Her focus over the course of her career was repatriating trafficked children, and in Nevada her efforts had gone towards the youngest crop of test subjects, the group of three- to five-year-olds they had believed would have the best chance of integrating with society. She had gone back to the Victim Services Division weeks prior to the situation finally boiling over. She remained one of a small collection of living FBI agents who had had close contact with a Hawkins survivor.

“I didn’t believe it at first, either, but then I actually met him.” He gestured to Peter on the screens in front of them. They were reviewing tapes of the brunette’s discussions with the team, conducted late in the day on Tuesday. Peter hadn’t come to Chicago until his legal counsel could be flown in, his college roommate Previn Warren. That had been another shock, that Peter’s close-knit group of college friends had knowledge of his origins, beyond Agent Myers.

“And you’ve been in contact with him since August?”

“July on Hinge, and August in person.”

“You dated an augment. That just blows my mind.”

The agent and his old colleague were reviewing footage from interviews with the Buttigieg family, conducted between the afternoon of the 18th and the previous day. That brunch family get-together was the only date Chasten had ever had an FBI stakeout team intervene in, but wasn’t that just the story of his life at this point. Sadly, it still did not rank among his ten worst dates.

“Genetically engineered for perfection, and he always held the door for me. He’s the best boyfriend I ever had.” He really had been. Kind, thoughtful, and utterly charmed by Chasten despite apparently being well aware of his day job, Peter had pressed buttons the blond didn’t know he had until he was gone.

“I still can’t believe the straight face he’s keeping through this inquisition. If that’s not proof he’s just as terrific an actor as 014, I’m not sure what is. They’re all one safety from blowing.”

On screen, Peter flicked his eyes up from the manila file on his lap. “ _Actually, I don’t think he intended to spare_ _Agent Glezman_ _at all. I think he just missed._ ”

“ _Excuse me?_ ” That was Jim, a bit of incredulity creeping past his reserve.

“ _My vision is 20/100, Director. I couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn without_ _corrective lenses_ _. Bobby’s eyesight isn’t any better, and I doubt 014’s was,_ _either_ _. Did you not know?_ ” Peter had completely stonewalled them for most of the day, only answering the questions he saw fit. Generally they were not the questions the FBI most wanted answered. Warren had backed him up at every turn, with the justification that Peter was a victim, not a suspect, and one who was quite right not to trust the goodwill of the FBI after all that happened.

“… _I suppose, in the minds of your old overseers, only_ people _need to be able to read a blackboard._ ” Dr. Moore, injecting a bit of her own opinion into the planned line of questioning. By this point, the brunette’s reticence had quite thoroughly gotten on her nerves.

“ _Only people need to be able to read_ _at all_ ,” Peter corrected. He was such a voracious reader that it was nearly unimaginable he had spent the first years of his life without access to a single book.

If Jim had been an outwardly objective interviewer and Smith downright sympathetic by the end, Moore had been a brutal interrogator. Given the subject matter—human experimentation, child abuse, and deep state conspiracies—even the most delicately-phrased inquiries were a minefield, but Moore had treated the man sitting across from her as if he were some kind of database instead of a person who had suffered and deserved consideration. Looking at other people and seeing something other than people was how evil things like Hawkins were born in the first place. The attitude certainly hadn’t convinced the mayor to spill his confidence.

Peter had maintained his composure for the entire walk out of the building and across the parking garage, but eventually the long day and brutal questioning must have gotten to him. Highway cameras recorded Warren pulling over at the first rest stop beyond the city limits. They had spent nearly an hour there, Peter sobbing in his friend’s arms, until the brunette’s tear ducts had exhausted themselves. The next day, Anne and Joe had politely stonewalled everyone they met during their own trip to the field office, even in response to inquiries Chasten had been so sure they would be happy to answer. The agent had a hard time not connecting the two events.

“He’s still a human being, Elena. None of them were safe when they were growing up if they showed one flash of what was really in their heads. That leaves a mark, but that doesn’t make any of them anything but thinking, feeling people.”

“Don’t chastise me, Glezman. You know I used to think the same, but they proved me wrong, all of them. Those little kids, they’d just been through too much, I thought. They were never going to be normal. And you can’t tell me you ever really believed the older ones were people anymore, especially after 014 snapped. There was nothing left to save.” Elena had been one of the caretakers who burned out, who found the magnitude of what they were contending with overwhelming.

“Do you know what I want to know, now that I know him?” Chasten gestured to Peter on the monitor. They’d been going back and forth for hours, taking notes for their reports. There would be no convincing her. “I want to know who 014 would have been, if he’d had a safe place to sleep at night, and people in his life who loved him. I want to know what the professors did that helped the child in their care, so that we might have better helped the children in ours. I don’t want to live in a world where a bunch of mad scientists perfect torture to the point that there’s nothing left to save before they even get through with one of their victims.”

Elena was finally looking at him rather than her notes, her hands held up in surrender. “Okay, okay, I’ll keep my commentary to myself after this. Just remember that I have more experience dealing with survivors than you do.”

Chasten glanced back at the recording, where the room was breaking for lunch. Colonel Smith stepped in front of Peter, halting his and his attorney’s progress toward freedom. He held out his right hand for Peter to take. “ _Mr. Mayor, Lieutenant Buttigieg, thank you for your service to our country. And I don’t say that lightly to a squid._ ”

Peter huffed a quiet laugh. “ _I know that I’_ _ll_ _just have to take what I can get from a ground-pounder._ ”

It had been a rare moment of respect on a long, miserable day.

**FBI Field Office, Chicago – October 30 th, 2015**

One week after compiling his report, and two weeks after he last saw Peter in person, Special Agent Glezman found himself in the Director’s office, closing out their fake dating surveillance mission and reviewing what they had learned.

The team had picked up three threads as worthy of long-term examination. The first was the continued investigation of the bread price-fixing scheme that had funded the Hawkins facility in its later years, which had turned out to have been unraveled by Peter himself during his time at McKinsey & Company. He had carefully rearranged the finances at Loblaw’s grocery chain to keep the price of brand name carbohydrates stable but redirect the extra profits to charity rather than violations of the Geneva Conventions. He had been unwilling to admit how he had come to discover the Hawkins connection, but believed some of the background the Bureau had been missing could be used to track possible satellite Hawkins sites and determine their method of funding after all of the bread line had been cut off for good. Not bad for a nerdy kid with some spreadsheets and a slide deck.

The second was the deployment to Afghanistan that had allowed the national intelligence apparatus to identify the brunette in the first place as anything other than the nondescript Lieutenant Buttigieg. The FBI had received an anonymous tip in late 2014, the kind of anonymous that everyone knew was really being passed down from high up in the food chain and was understood to require swift action. Eventually, that clue had allowed the Hawkins project task force to tie the financial web in Canada to living survivors. The manner of it had been what had convinced them for a time that Peter might be a conspirator in the cover up. In one of his sporadic bouts of cooperation, the Navy Reserve veteran had helped the team identify which members of his own Threat Finance Task Force in the Middle East likely had ties to other intelligence agencies and might have been pipelines to Hawkins. To someone with Peter’s past, a brother in arms who had furthered the Hawkins project’s goals was no brother at all.

The third was completely new and unexpected even if it shouldn’t have been. Hawkins project scientists had tested various implants over the years on their subjects, all of which were completely custom and none of which had been traced successfully to any lab outside of the project. Peter had provided them with a set of high resolution medical scans and a set of dates. Clearly depicted in the test results were a set of old bone-strengthening implants, purchased from medical research firms in the earliest days of live testing. Serial numbers were visible in the images, the first the task force had seen with a known point of origin. Peter hadn’t identified the star of the records, but the agent was more than capable of matching the stiff set of the brunette’s shoulders over the summer with the cause. Chasten had never intended for his life to become a sci-fi miniseries, but he figured sleeping with a cyborg created in a secret Indiana wine cave lab had capped it off.

Three leads, more conspirators, possibly even more survivors out there somewhere. Chasten was to be involved with none of them. He was going back to the classroom as soon as this was wrapped up.

“He’s obviously aware of what happened in Nevada and trusts the lot of us as far as he can throw us, but he’s put the greater good before his own interests. What little information he gave us is plainly designed to maximize our impact while minimizing our contact with anyone in his circle. Protecting long time allies without jeopardizing anyone else still caught up in this.” Across the desk from the blond, Jim mused aloud, closing the files on his desk and tipping his neck to contemplate the ceiling tiles. “I understand why you like him. He’s tough as anything when he needs to be, but he doesn’t let what he’s been through harden him against other people. That’s a rare kind of strength.”

The leather of the director’s old desk chair, a comfortable relic of their offices prior to the new cubicles’ installation the year before, creaked under his weight as he rocked forward to his previous position, bending over to rifle through a desk drawer. His mentor continued speaking as he pushed papers aside.

“More than that, I appreciate what he’s done for you. I know this assignment has been difficult. I know it’s come on the heels of so many setbacks, personal and professional. I know you didn’t want to dig up the life of a man you’ve come to respect. I’ve also seen a new confidence in your step, and I think that your time with him helped put it there.”

Jim’s craggy face lifted up a bit when he found his prize, a hoarded tube of thin mints. He helped himself to a pair of cookies, then parceled out a stack onto a tissue, sliding the pile across the desk to his subordinate.

“I think you make him better, too. He wouldn’t have been a target for a honeypot if he really had his life together, and he wouldn’t have romanced a man he knew was spying on him if he didn’t find the idea of being with someone who already knew his darkest secrets tempting.”

Chasten popped a chocolate-covered wafer into his mouth, savoring the flavor for a bit while he contemplated what to say. He settled on a question of his own, asking, “Where are you going with this, Jim?”

“We’ll get there, agent. Mayor Buttigieg is cleared on all counts, and it turns out we actually owe him quite the debt of gratitude for the leads he’s provided us. He’s no longer under investigation, and you’re no longer investigating him. You should give him a ring.”

“… I should call the man I informed on to the FBI for four months, while NSA foiled all of his attempts to find a real date, and do what? Invite him to trivia night at the pub?” Chasten was incredulous at the suggestion.

“He’d kill it at pub trivia, and if we ever compete against that insufferable BAU team again, he’s invited just to see the looks on their faces when they’re crushed at their own game. But that’s beside the point!” There wasn’t much that annoyed Jim more than their pub trivia losses to the traveling profiling team based out of the beltway, and Chasten had hoped mention of them would derail his boss from his train of thought. An awkward guy in a sweater vest had nailed every Star Trek question they had missed. Alas. “If this gets to HR, I’m done for, but some circumstances require us to cut the bullshit and speak frankly. You want to cuddle with him on the couch just as much as you want to pound him into the mattress, and so does he or he wouldn’t have planned that sappy rom-com stargazing date, complete with wine and charcuterie. That’s serendipity, and you shouldn’t let him go. Call him.”

“I really don’t think he’d take a call from me right now.”

“You know where he lives and works, don’t you? Are you a federal agent or aren’t you? An agent always gets their man, Glezman.”

“… yes, sir.”

**Safe House Apartment, Chicago—November 2 nd, 2015**

A weekend off to contemplate, his first since he’d received his assignment in July, hadn’t brought the agent any clarity. He’d caught up on his family’s Facebook updates, cleaned out the scruffy safe house from top to bottom, and wandered the home goods aisles at Target, drink in hand, and he was still just as irritated about the situation as he had been leaving Director Lindquist’s office on Friday afternoon. So he gathered his courage and took the step he’d been avoiding for months: he called his mom for advice.

“Boo! I’m so glad you rang!”

Sherri Glezman had picked up on the first ring. Chasten wasn’t surprised; he’d been distant from his family since the incident at the Nevada blacksite, and they were all worried for him. His mom would take any chance to hear from him she could get.

“Hey, mom. There’s a situation I want your opinion on. Do you have a few?”

“For you, honey, I always have time. Spill.” The faint undertone of anxiety in her voice faded a bit. She always felt better in a bad situation when there was something she could do to help.

“I fake dated a guy for an investigation. He’s cute and he makes me feel safe. Now that it’s all over, I’m trying to decide if I should ask him out on a real date.”

“Baby, I thought you said you weren’t in the field anymore. Who on earth were you fake dating for the FBI? Is this why you didn’t want us to visit last month?”

“His name is Peter. He loves dogs, coffee, and civic engagement. He’s a public servant.”

“That’s pretty vague, Chasten. And, again, why were you undercover investigating this ‘Peter’?” Now she was starting to apply that Midwestern mom pressure. The anxiety must be ramping up again.

“Do you remember last year when I moved to Nevada to help those people who’d been broken out of a rogue government lab?” Unlike Peter, Chasten had been telling his parents everything for years, including his misadventures with genetically-engineered kindergartners. With people as probing as his family could be, secrets had a limited shelf life. In the battle of mom versus the federal government in the life of her son, mom always won.

“It’s the kind of thing that’s tough to forget. Those poor things had never even seen the sun before.”

“Yep, those kids. Peter was one of a group of them who got rescued in the 90’s. He was raised by this lovely couple in Indiana. I still have no idea how they found him, actually. He’s as brilliant and kind as he is adorable, and I’m ruined for normal men going forward. It’s lab-grown super beings or bust, now. GMOs only.”

“All good points, but you wouldn’t be calling if there wasn’t something holding you back.”

“When I said he’s a public servant, I meant he’s a _very_ public servant. He’s the mayor of South Bend, Indiana, and he’s up for reelection tomorrow. He also still has at least a side project to hunt down offshoots of the organization that had him as a kid. So life with him would never be boring, but it probably wouldn’t be very peaceful, either.”

As he spoke, Chasten could hear shuffling and the clack of his mother’s nails against a keyboard. She was googling Peter, muttering under her breath as she scrolled through the results. When he heard a quick intake of breath, he knew she’d found one of the military photos. The man was a snack in uniform.

“Oh, my, he is handsome. And seven years older than you!” Mom was weary of older boyfriends after the disaster of a relationship that preceded his assignment to Nevada. She was probably extra weary of older boyfriends in positions of power who were stronger than the average bear. Chasten hadn’t explicitly told his parents what the kids he’d been helping could bench, but they knew that the physical differences had sometimes been difficult to deal with.

“It’s probably more like five or six, honestly. He assumed the identity of the person they cloned the first batch of kids from, so he’s at least a little bit younger.”

It was a distinction without a difference, to the woman who’d raised him. “Chasten, you and I both know the number itself isn’t the problem.”

“I know, I know. I have a history of bad decisions and there are plenty of cons to dating this guy along with his virtues. I would never win at arm wrestling again in my life. He gives 100% to his city, and his side gig is more of a calling than a job he can just set aside. But honestly, I’d respect him less if he didn’t put so much of his energy into making other people’s lives better. And when I was shoehorning my way into his schedule, I was one of those people, too.”

“Good works in a good package. I think you’ve already made up your mind. But you keep your dad and I in the loop this time? If you need support or someone to talk to, we’re here, and if it gets serious, we want to meet him sooner rather than later.”

“Yes, ma’am. Hey, I saw the pictures of the Halloween maze dad took the cousins to! Where was that?” If one of the benefits of all of this was becoming close with his family again, well, that was nothing to turn down. The romance in his future was uncertain, but that was no reason not to reclaim his life.

**West Side Democratic Club, South Bend – Election Day, 2015**

In the end, Chasten decided to try a more personal touch and track down Peter at a public event from which there was no escape: his reelection party in South Bend.

The reaction to the mayor’s coming out hadn’t all been good, and with something so deep-rooted and personal as this, what someone might say to a person’s face didn’t always match what they said at the ballot box. Chasten knew Peter had worried about the election, because while he had seemed unlikely to lose, rejection at the polls could show itself in other ways. Increased turnout for his opponent, longtime supporters staying home, comments made to news crews outside of voting stations. He was glad that the narrative was going to turn the other way, with an overwhelming victory. 80%, he knew, was more than Peter had thought was possible. From across the stuffy room, decorated with decades’ worth of political signage, Chasten could see the relief on his face.

The agent wound up in conversation with a group of local education advocates as he worked his way through the crowd. The herd was thinning, people heading home or heading to a bar to either commiserate or continue the elebration. On her way out, Anne Montgomery gave Chasten a piercing stare, Joe tugging her along. When the last of the teachers headed out to get ready for the next day, he caught the mayor’s eye. Peter looked a bit surprised to see him, but nodded firmly in return, excusing himself from well-wishers, and heading in Chasten’s direction. His expression was relaxed but closed off.

“Agent Glezman, I’m surprised to see you here.” It stung, to hear Peter call him by that title, even though it made sense after the interrogation and weeks of silence.

“I’m just Chasten here. I’m back to training, and you’re not under investigation anymore.”

“Fair enough. How are you liking being back in the classroom? I saw that you were just wrapping up a seminar around the time we met.”

Chasten’s patience was a bit worn for small talk, but that last sentence was an unexpected new detail, if he was understanding it correctly. “You’ve known since August?”

“Since just before we met in person, yeah. Look, I do take some precautions. I know that I could be a target, under certain circumstances.”

“Why _did_ you go along with it?”

“At first, just to see what exactly the FBI was up to. After we got to know each other a bit… I didn’t have to worry about telling you, or about what you would think when you found out. You knew all along, and you liked me anyway, even though you were on a mission. Maybe it’s selfish, but more than anything else, I just… wanted someone to know me, really know me. And you could’ve been that someone.” Peter’s expression relaxed a bit into self-recrimination, as if he were blaming himself for what made him vulnerable.

“Could be, I could be that person. And you could be that person for me, I think. I just wish we could’ve met under easier circumstances. I want a do-over, surveillance is such a cock-block.”

Peter huffed a laugh, sticking out his hand between them. “Hi, I’m Pete Buttigieg. You have the most beautiful smile I’ve ever seen, and I’d like to get to know the guy behind it. Can I interest you in a cup of coffee?”

Chasten reached out to take it, holding tight. “Chasten Glezman, nice to meet you, Peter. You don’t have a half-bad smile, yourself, and I’d love to sit down for a coffee with you, so long as it’s pumpkin spice.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic is brought to you by social distancing, and inspired by Dark Angel and procedural dramas. I don’t know if Pete and Chasten actually play Pandemic, but whether they do or not, that will be the next board game to make an appearance.


	6. File 05 - The First Day

**South Shore station, South Bend—November 7 th, 2015**

On their second first date, Special Agent Glezman and Subject 013 stayed where they belonged, home in the file system of the FBI. Chasten, freed from his obligations for the weekend but now without a convenient loaner car from his employer, hopped on the first train out of Chicago to South Bend in the morning.

The one upside of the sleepy, two hour ride was time to himself, which had been a rarity since he had first been sucked into the Hawkins investigation the year before. Chasten had brought along two textbooks for the occasion, required reading for the two classes per semester he was taking toward completing his Master’s in Education. It would be put to use teaching very special agents rather than very special teenagers, but he was still intent on pursuing the degree. He’d signed himself over to the federal government to pay these bills, and so long as they were willing to cover this particular one, he planned on continuing to accrue it.

So Chasten let himself sink into his reading, absentmindedly munching on a granola bar as he turned the pages and took notes. The honeypot scheme had been nearly a full time job on top of his regular obligations, and it was a relief to have some time back for his schooling in the evenings and weekends. The half-load was aggressive under his normal schedule, and downright demonic under the conditions of the fake dating investigation, so the time passed quickly until the final stop was announced and he stood to gather his things.

Peter’s smiling face, obscured by a cozy scarf and knit cap, greeted him on the far side of the fence when he exited the train car. His eyes crinkled up, a bit of mischief in them, when he greeted Chasten, “Howdy!”

He was such a dork. It was a good thing Chasten liked that about him. “Howdy, yourself,” he deadpanned, not quite able to suppress his own grin in return.

Peter’s smile stretched a little wider, and he opened his arms a bit to encourage Chasten closer. The man was angling for a hug, clearly not intending to play this as if it were really their first date. Fair enough, neither was Chasten. He’d packed clothes for an overnight stay in his backpack, puffing it out enough to make their embrace a bit awkward but no less warm for the clumsiness of it.

“C’mon, let’s get out of the cold,” Peter murmured where his face was tucked against Chasten’s ear. He really was giving his all to this hug, as if he’d worried Chasten wasn’t going to show. Freezing rain was battering the sidewalk away from the awning, the kind of dreary November that showed Lake Michigan’s influence on the land around it. If it had been just a bit warmer out, they would be experiencing quite the blizzard.

Chasten nodded back against Peter, slipping out of his arms and trotting toward the man’s scruffy Taurus. Opening the passenger side door, he was greeted by a familiar scent: pumpkin spice latte.

Peter must have noticed Chasten’s nose wrinkling, because he gestured to the insulated cup nestled between the seats, and piped up, “You said you’d have coffee with me if it was pumpkin spice! I had them make it in the travel mug so it would stay warm while I waited. And I didn’t forget to tip!”

Over the drink, Chasten leaned over to give Peter a peck on the cheek. Against all odds, the man really was a sweetheart, and the drink was a comforting little presence against his decision to jump into this with both feet. “Thanks, babe. I wasn’t actually expecting it, but I’ll never turn down pumpkin spice.”

“I’m glad I got it right! Look, I was thinking, after this past week, that we could probably both use a quiet weekend. How do you feel about dropping your stuff off at my place, making a quick lunch, and then heading out to see a movie? You said last week that you wanted to see _He Named Me Malala_? It’s showing this afternoon. Or we could go see _Spectre_ and pick it apart.”

Chasten reached over to wrap his hand around the cup, taking a quick sip. “That sounds great. I could do with something a bit more low key right now.”

The afternoon proved itself to be just the kind of low key he had needed. Over coffee and the simple lunch that followed in Peter’s kitchen, they discussed the ins and outs of wastewater management (apparently more interesting and complicated than it sounded, somehow involving a neural network) and Chasten’s courses in Chicago. They found themselves discussing how theater had played out in their lives and careers, from Chasten’s high school safe haven to Peter’s daily deception, and how to be yourself even when you couldn’t be. They both knew what it meant to pretend to be something they weren’t, and what it meant to find solace in that despite the weight of it. Chasten, as the one with formal training, was able to put words to the structure of Peter’s double life (triple life?) that it seemed he had never discussed with anyone in any real detail, even though his closest friends had known the broad strokes of it for years. It was an extreme example he’d never be able to provide to his students, but it gave him some ideas for future seminars.

The movie date went by similarly quickly. In the end, a passion for teaching won out over more spy shenanigans, and they wound up in their own row of a quiet screening of _He Named Me Malala_. Later, they dug into the movie alongside their pasta at Peter’s kitchen table, again proving to be on that complimentary wavelength that had ignited the spark that initial attraction into a roaring fire on those early, fictitious dates. It had become a relationship where desire and respect went hand in hand.

Talk of one girl in Pakistan jogged his memory of a group of children in the country to its north, who had in their own way lead him to Peter.

“Peter, those kids in Afghanistan… why did you step in when you knew you might be found out? No one had any inkling any of the escapees from 1991 survived until then. You didn’t just get the children out, you made sure nothing that had been done there could be rebuilt. None of the research was recoverable, and it sounds like that’s what made that other officer suspicious in the first place, that it seemed like you knew what was important.” Chasten had an inkling himself of why everything went down the way it did, but in this case he wanted something resembling a definite answer and had the opportunity to get it.

Peter contemplated his fork for a moment, swirling a few noodles around it. “They say sunshine is the best disinfectant, and I can’t say I disagree. If you’d handed me in and your team had been sympathetic to the Hawkins Project’s aims after all, well… Look, let’s just say there are some very public traps laid for any collaborators, and plans to keep all of the survivors under the open sky.”

It was a sobering reminder of what had happened at the Nevada site, which despite the wide open sky had been more of a series of cages with no definite pathway out for their so-called guests.

“Tell me they’re all still free.” Peter startled at that and Chasten hastened to reassure him that he would not dig too deeply, “I know that there are secrets that don’t belong to you, and I don’t want to know where they’re at or who they’re with, I just want to know they’re far away from anyone with an interest in the project.”

“That much I can give you—they’re free and the people who ran that lab aren’t.” Peter wrinkled his nose down at his nearly empty plate, finished with one thought but already lost in another. He had lived in his own internal world for so long that there were things he didn’t know how to say.

Chasten would give Peter the time and support he needed to come out of his shell, but he knew that “time” was the operative word. “Babe, want to get the game ready while I clear away these dishes?” He patted his companion’s hand, and the man looked comically grateful for the out. Clearly, the only reason it had taken so long for him to be found out was that no one’s first guess for a scandal in the mayor’s office would be an escaped super soldier.

By the time Chasten returned to the living room, beers in hand, Peter was ensconced on the couch that had made the agent wonder if his target was colorblind in addition to his general poor eyesight. The fireplace he had fiddled with before dinner had been stoked to a glowing, self-sustaining heat, and he had moved the large, graying blanket they’d cuddled under on previous dates from the armchair to the couch. A worn game box had been placed on the low center table, along with their snacks. He looked comfortable, at home, waiting for Chasten there.

What followed was the most cutthroat game of Pandemic Chasten had ever played, infections eliminated systematically rather than merely cured, a feat for a tabletop game that relied so heavily on openness and collaboration. All of the diseases were clearly labeled in block letters—SARS, INFLUENZA, PLAGUE, SMALLPOX—too neat to be Peter’s own, with the pieces sorted into baggies marked by the same hand. They were both driven, detailed people, and it showed when they played board games, so they started their first round with the full set of epidemics, no such thing as easy mode despite their position cuddled side by side under the blanket.

It had been a long time since Chasten had played a game with someone just to play a game, and he hadn’t realized how much he needed it until he found himself yawning, four rounds in, a clear sign that it was time to turn in. Peter had set out a guest bedroom for him, but Chasten saw no need to use it. Their official date tally may have changed, but the comfort they had developed had not. When Peter returned from the bathroom ready for bed, book in hand, the agent had already claimed what had become “his” side of the bed during previous visits. Peter, eyebrows raised, settled himself beside his boyfriend under the comforter.

Sometime in between scrolling through pictures of his niece and nephew and replying to his aunt’s message about Christmas, Peter had fallen asleep, the Energizer Bunny finally running out of charge. It was the earliest Chasten had seen him give in to the Sandman, a sure sign of how stressful the week had been for him. Chasten had no idea how he’d juggled his reelection and the FBI investigation with his already-demanding job as mayor, which Peter sometimes seemed to treat as more of a way of life. In the low light of the bedside lamp, the dark circles below his eyelids and the lines of stress between his brows seemed more pronounced.

Chasten reached over to where Peter’s book had tipped out of his fingers and onto the comforter, and tucked over one flap of the jacket to mark his place. He slid the text over to the table next to the lamp, supporting the brunette with an arm around his shoulder as he tried not to wake him. It was one of those times Peter’s physical differences were obvious to someone who knew what they were looking for, his modifications giving him a density belied by his slim build. Chasten continued scrolling, now one-handed, through his Facebook feed with his boyfriend a cozy dead weight snug under his elbow. When he was ready to succumb to slumber himself, he turned off the lights and pulled the comforter over both of them.

**Peter’s home, South Bend—November 8 th, 2015**

When Chasten woke, the sun low in the sky, he was surprised to find Peter limp against him underneath the comforter, still completely dead to the world. He glanced at the clock on the nightstand. It was nearly nine o’clock. Peter wouldn’t sleep forever, and Chasten’s stomach was rumbling in anticipation. Perhaps breakfast in bed was just what the doctor ordered, for both of them. The brunette’s fridge had looked a bit less pathetic than on their last date the night before, so he threw on a sweatshirt and padded his way down to the kitchen.

Under the circumstances, Chasten had hit the jackpot on breakfast supplies. Forget the Wheaties, one bonus of dating a man with a massive appetite and little in the way of kitchen instincts was that he could be impressed by relatively simple culinary transformations. This weekend, Peter’s haphazard pantry included the right leftovers to make an acceptable pair of breakfast burritos. The potatoes were about a week shy of being firm, but a grater and some peppers could hide a multitude of sins.

Peter’s eyelids creaked open when Chasten made his way back upstairs, burritos and coffee in hand. The drafty old house had spread the scent of the meal far enough to wake him. He levered himself up against the headboard, rubbing his eyes.

“I’m sorry if I haven’t been very good company this morning.”

“There’s nothing wrong with needing some rest after the week you’ve had, babe.”

“It’s just… this week, I got everything I wanted. I was reelected, I’m officially free, and this cute guy I like agreed to go on a date with me. I wasn’t expecting it to be so exhausting.”

“I think that’s plenty of stress all coming to a head at once. What was it like the week you came out?”

“I’ve heard people describe coming out as this huge weight coming off of their shoulders, and it was. I’ve been keeping secrets my entire life—I’ve had to—but I was surprised to find out how heavy this one really was. But coming out in my home town was the freest thing I’ve ever done.”

“Why did you come back? Isn’t Indiana a risky place for both secrets?”

“In Massachusetts, in London, I felt unmoored. But then I came back here to friends and family, and I’ve had the chance to help remake the place that made me. It was a shock to leave South Bend at eighteen and realize that the place I’d long regarded as heaven had fallen so far behind. And I’ve had something important to contribute to remedying that.”

“But why as mayor, why not in business or something else?”, Chasten asked. He and the rest of his team hadn’t been able to ascertain the reason for seeking public office in a place that seemed as much of a dead end as northern Indiana, which had left Peter with all of the risks and few of the rewards of a similar office in a more liberal area with a stronger economic position. And it was part of why the “honorable lieutenant” had stood out in Afghanistan, despite his best efforts.

Peter paused for a moment, considering. “Part of it was… We felt like we were playing whack-a-mole with Hawkins’ funding, but I just didn’t want to live my life in fear of being found out forever. Maybe it was another kind of coming out, doing something as public as run for office despite the risks. That first statewide campaign sure terrified mom and dad. The other part...” Peter snorted, Chasten feeling the reverberation where they touched, then continued, “The other part was I just had trouble finding a job. That’s when I told my friend Nat I’m gay, when I realized one kind of coming out might make the other impossible, event if DADT was repealed.”

“Nat knew but not Mike? I thought you told Mike before you ran for state treasurer?”

“No, Nat was the only person I told until last year. I was so afraid of disappointing everyone. Of being selfish and making all of the sacrifices my family made so that I could have a life in vain. I told Mike about Hawkins, in case someone associated with the project approached him, but not about the rest.”

“Oh, Peter.” Chasten ran his fingers through Peter’s thick hair, trying to comfort him.

“I’d changed everything else about myself to fit in enough to go to school, to make friends. What was one more alteration?”

Chasten had no good answer to that question, if indeed it was a question at all. He held Peter tighter, hoping he could gain some comfort from the embrace.

“I fell apart on him when I finally saw him a few months after I got back from Afghanistan. I was a blubbering, incoherent mess, but I was just so lonely and I couldn’t go on like that anymore. He was terrified. He thought I was going to hurt myself. He helped me practice coming out to my parents so that when I was finally ready I’d be able to get through it, and he probably told them about you, too.”

“Nat sounds like a good friend.” As much as Peter seemed an open book to Chasten, everything he was feeling written in his eyes, he knew the brunette was more than capable of keeping his greatest struggles locked down tight. Nat’s exact role within the Company was obscured, but they knew he’d spent extensive time in the field since at least the Somaliland trip. Beyond knowing his dear friend like a brother, he would have been well-versed in evaluating and exploiting the same kinds of vulnerabilities as the FBI. He would have been able to spot just how isolated Peter was emotionally better than anyone, and if he had worried about self-harm he had probably been right to do so. Chasten was beyond grateful Peter was in a better place today, even if he still had a way to go to come out of his shell.

“Only the very best. No idea what I would’ve done without him.”

“Or anyone else for that matter, since I’m guessing what you’ve spilled so far is just the tip of the iceberg.”

Peter entwined his fingers with those of Chasten’s free hand, rubbing his thumb over his index finger. “It really is like this huge weight’s been lifted, one that was heavier than I ever realized. I had no idea what a relief it would be to have everyone who mattered to me really know who I was… all the parts of Pete the left-handed, millennial, Maltese-American, science experiment, Episcopalian, war veteran, gay, mayor.” When he tipped his head up to look at Chasten, he was grinning. He pecked Chasten on the lips, continuing, “The circumstances may have been a bit odd, but not any stranger than the rest of it, and I am so glad we met.”

Chasten returned the kiss, silently giving a cheer for the hot sauce hiding any hint of morning breath. “You forgot ‘boyfriend’ in that list! I’m glad we met, too.”

“I really did want to take you on that coffee date I promised back in July, you know. How do you feel about brunch? The place I’m thinking of has plenty of lighter options since we just ate, and we can pack up the car before we go and I can drop you off right at the train station afterwards.”

A light brunch out sounded perfect, so Chasten arranged his things for the train ride home and packed his bag into Peter’s car. Chicory Cafe, when they arrived, was just as cozy a place as Chasten had expected. It was exactly the kind of quirky, local establishment Peter would choose for a date in his home town. Points for the food, points for the atmosphere, points for the chalkboard menus, and extra special bonus points for the make-your-own Bloody Mary bar. They shared an order of beignets and a plate of fruit over cups of coffee and Chasten’s impressively stacked cocktail. His date would return him safely to the train station for his trip home, after all.

It was the first time they’d really been accessible to the public all weekend, so Peter’s constituents dropped by as they came after eating or picking up their orders, sometimes just to say hello and sometimes to talk about the upcoming Veteran’s Day. Regardless of the topic, the proud mayor was never too shy to brag about his city, and he always returned to Chasten.

Chasten loathed to see the end of it, but once his drink was finished, they packed themselves out to the depot. Peter carried his bag from the car to the station, and sent him off with a hug and a wave.

**South Shore line, approaching the Illinois border—November 8 th, 2015**

Stomach grumbling and a little bit bored, Chasten reached into his bag for the granola bar he’d packed to tide himself over during the long ride back to Chicago over another study session. His fingers were interrupted on their way to their prize of high density carbs and sugar by an unexpected package. When Chasten pulled it from its confines, the obstruction turned out to be a carefully-folded paper bag with Chicory Cafe’s logo displayed prominently. Inside was one of the caprese sandwiches he’d eyed at the restaurant, an apple to match the basket on Peter’s kitchen counter, and a slim 12 ounce Nalgene bottle.

The bottle, filled with water to wash down the meal, was ensconced in a sheet of notebook paper and secured with a rubber band. Chasten slipped the paper off, revealing a slightly abused South Bend flag sticker, cut into the shape of the Hoosier state. Written on the lined sheet in Peter’s barely comprehensible scrawl, and therefore subject to some interpretation, was a poem about the date they’d just wrapped up. It was as heartfelt as it was cheesy.

Whether he was trying to win Chasten over with a sappy retelling of picking him up at the airport station or just planning on taking advantage of Midwestern social mores to score another meeting (the bottle would have to be returned, after all), Peter had charmed him with his earnestness. He had already won himself far more than a second date.


	7. File 06 - Unnatural Selection

**FBI Field Office, Chicago—November 12 th, 2015**

Sometimes it felt like every time he took one step forward, he was forced ten steps back.

In the spirit of “the last person who touched it owns it” that governs so many workplaces, Special Agent Glezman found himself officially assigned to his old desk in the Hawkins investigation just one week after wrapping up the honeypot paperwork. Theoretically, it was given with the excuse that it wouldn’t make sense for him to pick up more classes in the middle of the semester than the seminar he was already leading but he knew full well that time had a way of making things permanent. They needed what he knew, and were willing to hand him the occasional short course to placate him.

The armed forces liked their paperwork, even more than the Bureau, so their Afghanistan line of investigation quickly bore new fruit in the form of the woman who had figured out one of her colleagues wasn’t baseline human and reported him. US Army Specialist Galena Owens, formerly of the Threat Finance Task Force, hailed from Columbus, Indiana. She was deployed in Iraq and, until they were ready to read in the local FBI attache, out of their reach.

Her uncle Dave, however, was very much within their grasp. When Agents Jones and Ramirez, now read in on the investigation, had knocked on his door, the man had very helpfully volunteered his experience to aid in hunting down lost federal assets. He had brushed off any thought of a lawyer. The team lacked a hard case to charge him with anything just yet, so they had decided to treat him as a guest and curate him as a source for background, whether he was aware of the situation or not. Also, they were fresh out of black sites to stash persons of interest in for the time being.

Back at their office, they had set aside one of their more nondescript interrogation rooms, which was more of a thoroughly surveilled conference room. A fresh pot of coffee and a small plate of donuts at the edge of the table completed the illusion, visible in HD in the observation room down the hall and recorded for posterity. A stack of completed forms, carbon paper included, was set off to the side. It was all official paperwork, dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s for the investigation and making the interview feel more like a debriefing than the interrogation that it was in truth.

“Mr. Owens, are you ready to get going?”

“Dave is just fine by me. You said your first names are Karen and Francisco, right? Are you alright with first names? As exciting as it is to be back in the action for the day, I haven’t been so formal with anyone since I retired!” Himself an Army veteran, David Owens had worked security at the Hawkins facility for nearly thirty years prior to his retirement in 2006. He had stood guard through the escape, the loss of federal support and funding that had followed, and several new batches of children.

Jones gave him a cheerful smile right back. “Sure thing, Dave. I’d like to get started with some background, if you don’t mind. We’re fully read in, but as you know the project keeps so much of the documentation deliberately vague that we want to make sure we have the details straight. All those old hard copies, especially, you understand.”

“Believe me, I understand! We lost more than you would hope over the years to all the water in that basement! I’m just glad Lena’s report was taken seriously, and there’s some real support for the project from up above again.”

“Great! We understand you started in 1987. Is that correct?”

“Yes, as soon as I’d done my twenty I moved home and an old battle buddy recommended me to the project.”

“Jerry Lewis, right? We’re so sorry for your loss.” Lewis had been a true believer, and had moved into management rather than enjoy his retirement. He had died in 2011, and no one was sorry for his loss.

“Yeah, Jerry was good people.”

“You spent two years guarding the perimeter and controlling access, then moved to the inside of the facility, is that correct?”

“That’s correct. Even when you’re recommended, you have to prove your trustworthiness. After two years, they knew. I got moved inside, guarding the labs and transporting samples for three more years before I was put in charge of any of the subjects directly.”

“That was the year before the escape?”

“Nearly to the day, and I can tell you things around that place changed after that. But I worked on containment of the subjects until the day I retired.”

“You maintained some contact with the project, correct? Your niece didn’t start with Hawkins until 2008.” That was their best guess, thanks to the wonder of automatic payroll tax deductions. Galena Owens had spent much of her first year after returning from active duty aimless, bouncing from one part time gig to another. That had changed in September of 2008.

“Yeah, I kept in contact with some of the old guard, just a bunch of grumpy old men sharing stories over beer and barbecue with the only people we could really talk to. Lena had such a tough time after she got home. I knew what she really needed was a mission, something to let her know her service was worth it. That the sacrifice was worth it. It took her a while to really believe that, but she got there and she’s been all-in ever since.”

“She didn’t like working at Hawkins at first?”

“Nah, she got squeamish, said it brought back all of her worst memories from Afghanistan. She has a real strong moral backbone, that one. That’s why you have to ease the recruits into it… start them on the edges, make sure they’re loyal, let their ties to the place deepen first. Lena got pulled in without that transition period to ease the way.”

“How did she come to change her mind?”

“My niece, she used to be a big fan of this show called _Dark Angel_. It’s one of those cheesy, low budget dystopian shows for teenagers, and some of the main characters are genetically engineered soldiers who grew up in a lab. I had to be the one to tell her that real life isn’t like that, that those things in the cages in real life aren’t people, they just look like us. They don’t have secret names, or call each other brother and sister, or grow up to have lives hidden away from the evil paramilitary organization that spawned them. They’re very strong, very intelligent, barely tamed animals, and that big bad secret paramilitary force is full of patriots. Thankfully I had years’ worth of stories to back me up.”

“It’s tough to tell kids Santa isn’t real, isn’t it?” Jones said. She was Jewish, and regardless none of her three children were old enough to have internalized the existence or nonexistence of Santa.

“Yeah, that’s one way to put it.” Owens sighed and leaned back, wrists flat on the armrests of his chair. “But she understands now. She did her duty, reporting that escapee, and she’s still doing it now.”

“Oh, she’s still involved, even after the Reserves called her up again? You must be proud. We don’t have much contact with the main site since it was relocated. Information silos, you understand.” Ramirez quirked up the edge of his mouth a bit and gave a little shrug. The man had an incredible poker face. The main site had been completely, without warning, cleared out by their task force during the raid and relocated to the Nevada black site, including the personnel who were off-shift. There hadn’t been anyone to have contact with since 2013.

“No, she’s always been based out of the beta site. Her parents and I, we only know the broad strokes of what she’s working on, but yeah we’re proud alright!”

Now they were getting somewhere, but walking a tightrope not to give away their ignorance. The beta site had long been suspected, but never confirmed. Some of the senior Hawkins personnel had days of unexplained absences, but with no solid documentation to back up their inquiries and no reward for disclosure, anyone who may have known anything had been very tight-lipped. Unfortunately mind control rays were still in their infancy, even if you were at a black site with a bunch of overly enthusiastic Company men and women. Peter, who was considerably more forthcoming than anyone else, had regrettably only laid eyes on a very small portion of the facility where he had been kept and hadn’t known many names.

“How’s she doing at the beta site? It’s a bit far from home, isn’t it?” The facility they had raided, now confirmed to be the alpha site, was a pleasant half hour’s drive from the neighborhood Owens’ extended family had settled in, so it was a decent bet that the beta site was further away.

“Too far for commuting, for sure, but it’s an easy drive for a weekend trip, and I’m not going to turn down Lake Michigan.”

“No, the area’s nothing to scoff at.”

“I’ve always wondering who chose the location, so many sites like it are on massive federal properties.”

“The billionaires, you know. Who else?” Well, that was vague and unhelpful.

“Of course.”

“So it really was one of the Subjects she fingered, was it?”

“Yes.”

“Which one? 012 was a vicious little thing, all nails and teeth, but 013 was the one I always kept my eye on. Always watching, like it was just biding its time, waiting for a chance at our throats.”

“Actually, before we get into that, we’d like you to start by telling us about Subject 014.”

**Chasten’s apartment, Chicago—November 20 th, 2015**

Chasten had buried himself in schoolwork every evening after leaving the office, partly out of necessity (so much catch-up to do!) and partly to wash away the stain of the day. They had continued to curate Dave Owens as a source, and it was a balm to sit down and focus on the study of building students up rather than the unthinking, everyday evils he described without hesitation or remorse.

Galena Owens’ profile had been forwarded to NSA, who had run it through the PERFECTMATCH algorithm and selected several possible agents out of the field offices in Chicago, Indianapolis, and Detroit. One of them would be sent to her neighborhood to make themselves at home and assist with the hunt for the beta site until she returned from deployment. In the mean time, Peter, his own PERFECTMATCH, had continued to visit his own assigned agent’s apartment as if it really did belong to him, instead of being the prop it was.

The South Bend-themed water bottle in the kitchen nook had been joined by the steadily-growing collection of treats and trinkets that had migrated west with Peter. Goodies from the farmer’s market, an interesting one act play from a used bookstore, and an immensely cheesy apron had all come to brighten his safe house since he and Peter had officially started dating. The apron pocket had included one of Peter’s heartfelt little notes. It had been the right thing to bolster his mood after a rough week.

Tonight, Peter greeted Chasten late in the evening with a hug, a peck on the lips, and a pint of Ben & Jerry’s after a long commute to Chicago. Chasten had thrown together a cheap, one pot pasta dish, perfect autumn comfort food. It was already set out on the table when Peter arrived, and they dug in quickly. The mayor wasn’t one to share his burdens, but it was apparent it had been a long week at work for him, too. So they shared a near silent meal, although it was the restful kind of silence that lent warmth to an otherwise lifeless place. They both needed to recharge.

When they were finished eating, Peter washed the dishes while Chasten filled containers of leftovers. Once everything was either safely ensconced in the rack to dry or cooling in the poorly balanced old refrigerator, Chasten put the music on, and took Peter’s hand in his.

“I think we both need a distraction. Dance with me?” He pulled Peter in and settled one hand against his waist. The playlist was slow enough that even Peter would survive. Hopefully.

Peter let out a bark of a laugh. “You know by now that I’m not any good at dancing. If there were shoes with magical dancing powers, I would cancel the magic out.”

Chasten nudged the arm Peter was letting dangle awkwardly up onto his shoulder. “You’re not getting out of this that easily, buddy.”

Peter swayed in his arms, clumsily attempting to find and follow Chasten’s rhythm. He kept having to look down to watch the blond’s feet, an ungainly and uncoordinated dance partner. But he was the warm human contact Chasten needed after such a long week, and the tension was slowly draining from his shoulders. There was something sweet, too, about his partner stepping so far outside of his comfort zone to be there with him. He chuckled faintly whenever he missed a step.

After the third time the brunet knocked knees with him while attempting to mirror his steps, though, Chasten started to regret that decision, exclaiming, “Peter Paul, how can a man who’s done everything you’ve done still have no idea whatsoever how to dance?! You play the guitar, so clearly you’re capable of some coordination! Why not between your feet? Aren’t super soldiers supposed to be graceful? TV lied to me.”

“Look, even mad scientists have their areas of specialization, and clearly no one at Hawkins was much into dancing or they wouldn’t have given me two left feet.” The words came out muffled against Chasten’s shoulder as Peter shifted against him, but he could hear the follow-up clearly. “So it’s a good thing I have you to lead me.”

It was the right comeback, very smooth for Mayor Pete, super introvert and bruiser of toes. “All of this fancy theater training, all of my super secret federal agent skills, and I still can’t get you to string two steps together. I dunno, Peter, there just might not be any salvaging you.”

Peter leaned back, still swaying but restricting the movement of his feet just enough to keep his partner’s safe. He leaned his forehead against the agent’s, and started humming an uneven, badly out-of-tune rendition of _Secret Agent Man_. When he arrived at the third verse, he mouthed the lines “oh no you let the wrong word slip / while kissing persuasive lips” and Chasten couldn’t hold back any longer.

“Is that a hint, babe?”

“I’d say let’s focus on honing the skills I’ve a hope of mastering. Who better to teach me than the very special agent the government sent to sedu-”

The very special agent in question cut him off with one kiss, then another. It was the perfect ending to an imperfect week.

**Chasten’s apartment, Chicago—November 21 st, 2015**

When Chasten woke, warm and well-rested, it was to the faint smell of coffee and the low rumble of Peter’s voice through the thin door. Chasten tumbled out of bed, blanket wrapped snugly around his shoulders, dumping sweet creamer into his own mug while watching Peter take a Skype call on the futon. In French? Maybe? One of the major disadvantages of spying on a polyglot had been keeping track of what he was saying and who he was saying it to. It had been an unexpected development while tracking down a covert project dominated by Americans and the occasional English-speaking Canadian.

Peter glanced up from his laptop, and held one arm up in invitation. Probably not a work call, then. Chasten tucked himself against his boyfriend’s side. The man on the screen had bright red hair, and the same kind of quiet, fierce smile Anne had given him on their first meeting. It was the kind of smile that said _if you are here honestly, welcome, but if not I’ll_ _handle_ _you_. It was the smile of a Midwesterner ready for war.

“Mike, this is my boyfriend Chasten. Chasten, this is my friend Mike.” Ah, that explained the definitely-French and the evening sun in the background. And the low-key hostility, for that matter, since Mike was one of the friends confirmed to be in the know. In the know, and in possession of political connections the Bureau had found difficult to quantify.

“Nice to meet you, Chasten. Peter said he was spending the weekend in Chicagoland with you?” Thank goodness, Mike was playing it nice. It was too early to get into a conversational chess match with one of Peter’s closest friends. He’d at least eaten by the time Anne had ambushed him.

“Yep, Friday night and Saturday at least. He has events back home tomorrow, and I desperately need some time to finish a paper for school. Peter said you’re studying in Paris yourself?”

“Yeah, went back for my master’s. I have some papers to work on myself, tonight, so I’ll let you go. It really is good to meet you, Chasten. You and Peter take care of yourselves. And Pete, I’ll let you know what we find.”

“Thanks, Mike. À la prochaine.”

“À la prochaine, Pete.”

Peter folded the laptop closed, and leaned over to set it aside at a safe distance, far from the reach of wandering feet. Chasten held up one end of the blanket, allowing Peter to curl up beside him again while he sipped his coffee. The brunet waited for his boyfriend to get some caffeine metabolized before striking up a conversation. “Chasten, I know you love teaching, but why are you working so hard on your master’s if you’re not going to teach? You love kids, and I don’t get the impression you’re doing much teaching with the Bureau these days.”

The agent groaned into his mug, letting the breath out of his nose as he slumped further into his partner’s side. “Not starting me off easy this morning, are you, babe?”

“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to, I just want to understand.” It was said evenly and reassuringly, the kind of inquiry that made you want to spill all of the beans and then hand over the recipe. That voice was a powerful weapon, in the hands of a politician.

“I do want to teach, Peter, but I’m only four years in. I need another six to pay off my loans. I won’t be able to do it on a public school teacher’s salary.”

“You feel like you have no way out, because you’re counting on PSLF to forgive your loans after ten years’ service?”

“PSLF and all of the overtime associated with the Hawkins investigation. Sure, they roped me back in but I might have had a chance at stopping it if I really tried. I don’t want to live paycheck to paycheck forever. I’ve had room and board paid for for nearly a year and a half, between Nevada and fake dating this cute mayor, and even now it feels like I can never catch up… Let’s just say the course of undergrad did not run smooth.”

“Room and board… how much longer do you have this safe house? I was surprised you stayed here, and that none of the decorating changed except for the music and pictures. And this afghan.”

“I have until January 1st to evacuate, when the lease ends. We didn’t know how long this-”, here Chasten waved between him and and Peter and continued, “would go on. And the furniture was all seized. The afghan was made by my grandmother. I didn’t have much to bring with me.”

“Do you know where you’re going yet?”

“No idea, between work and school I haven’t had much time to go apartment hunting. Maybe I’ve been procrastinating because I’m afraid of adding rent checks to the pile.”

“Chasten-” He cut the brunet off with a finger to his lips. There was a difference in being ready to vent about something and really being ready to talk about it, even with someone who was as much of a helper at heart as Peter, and he wasn’t quite ready to let that part of the fairy tale end.

“While we’re stuck on heavy topics, there’s another one I’d like to bring up. But I need you to promise me you won’t go telling any other secret government agents, not even my coworkers.”

“Before I take a vow of silence, any hints as to what I’m promising to keep secret?”

“Not secret from everyone, but definitely from my team. It’s about Hawkins.” May as well tear the band aid off, and be direct. At the mention of Hawkins, Peter had stiffened minutely but not pulled away.

“I think I’ve clearly demonstrated my ability to keep secrets from large bureaucracies of all stripes. What new secrets am I keeping about the Hawkins project?”

“We have a good lead on the beta site. We’ve been able to corroborate some of the basic details. We think it’s still active, and we think we can find it.”

Peter focused his gaze directly on Chasten, the eerie kind of eye contact that meant he was really paying attention. “Why are you telling me this, Special Agent Glezman?”

“All Agent Glezman can tell you is that the investigation is ongoing. Chasten, though, he’s a little looser around people that he trusts.” He reached over to cradle Peter’s hands within his own. “Peter, you know I saw all of the tapes when you came into our office for questioning, and even then I knew you well enough to know when you were hiding something. I knew who you were, not just what, _who_. You cut off pieces of Hawkins’ support and funding over the years, and when you had the opportunity to shut down that facility in Afghanistan and get those kids somewhere safe, you did it. You have friends and allies, but you never had the sheer numbers you needed to raid the main facility, did you? Or to support the survivors?”

“No.” Peter’s voice was flat, but his eyes hadn’t wavered an inch from Chasten’s. Chasten brought one hand up to cup his cheek.

“I know you never would have left them there if you could help it. You knew how much help everyone you freed would need, I’m guessing?”

“More than I could give. And we couldn’t have raided the facility successfully prior to 2014, maybe not even after. Not without more people. Chasten, why are you telling me this?”

“Because when we raid the beta site—not if, when—it won’t be like last time. It’s a different team on our end, and we’ve updated our approach, but if our orders change, you at least have connections you can use to raise holy hell and make sure nothing and no one gets buried again. If you know what’s coming.”

“In that case, I have some phone calls to make, don’t I?”

Chasten gave him a peck on the lips. “I think you just might. If anyone ever asks, you spoke French all morning and I was busy writing papers and studying for finals. Because I definitely have some studying to do!”

“Speaking of studying, I know that school and the investigation are dragging into the weekends again and you can’t make it up to Traverse City, but if you can take Thursday off, please come over to my parents’ for Thanksgiving dinner. I’ll be participating in a few other events around town, so it’ll be fairly low key. Food, family, and football. I can drive you back to Chicago right after, if that’s when you need to get back.” Peter was pairing his sales pitch with earnest eyes. They had been tailored to be difficult to resist, and fulfilled their design specifications admirably.

“Oh, Peter. I have Thursday off. I can catch the train after work Wednesday. You’ll pick me up at the station, take me back here after dinner?” Peter perked up at the mention of Thanksgiving day, with his grin splitting his face at the mention of Wednesday night. They’d become so attached so quickly, and the distance was taking its toll. No amount of texting and Skype calls quite made up for real human contact. And Chasten was not the kind of fool who turned down a home-cooked meal, hopefully one with plenty of pie.

“Absolutely! Just tell me when.” Sometimes Chasten wondered how much time exactly the mayor’s aides spent rearranging his schedule to steal all of those little free moments in his. The desire went both ways, but the agent didn’t have the same kind of flexibility as his boyfriend in that department.

“What if I said I might just be able to stay over Friday, so long as I can take some time for schoolwork.”

“I’d say that I would love to have you. Also, if you can stay over Friday, there’s someone I want you to meet, after the turkey coma subsides. I think you’ll have a good talk, if you give yourselves the chance. I can still give you a ride home Friday.”

“Well, then, Mr. Mayor, what are the Black Friday deals like in the South Bend metro?”

**FBI Field Office, Chicago—November 25 th, 2015**

Director Lindquist had called Agent Glezman into his office again to go over some more recent aerial surveillance from the target area one last time before breaking for Thanksgiving. The team had had significant difficulty narrowing down the possible location of the beta site from the eight county area they had established based on Galena Owens’ known habits, her uncle’s testimony, and the scraps of documentation they had unearthed over the years of the investigation. Chasten, who had spent time at the original Hawkins site, was looking for spots that might fit the needs of a similar site. It wasn’t going well, with five counties in Michigan, three in Indiana, and an abundance of abandoned infrastructure that would make a suitable home for a lair full of mad scientists.

Jim sighed, leaning back in his creaky chair and arranging his fingers in a steeple beneath his chin as he examined the map and printouts arranged across his desk. “Apparently all roads do lead to South Bend in this investigation, because that’ll be our base of operations while we locate and clear out the beta site.”

“We’re about to find another horror movie wine cave, aren’t we?”

“Full of rats and Nazis, probably.”

“Just what is it with wine and these people?”

“I just wish they’d leave some for us when we clean them out, instead of creepy labs and body parts. And Glezman! You invite that boyfriend of yours to the team’s next round of pub trivia. We find another one of these hellholes, I want my people to know him as a person, and be primed to see anyone we discover there as a person, too. Well, that and I want to win.”

“He’ll nail every question about civil infrastructure, sure, but I’m not entirely certain he actually has any idea who Lady Gaga is, so you can’t get rid of the rest of us just yet, you know.”

“All I heard was ‘blah blah complimentary skillsets.’ I don’t see how that leads down any road but the road to victory.”

As much as Chasten wished he wasn’t still a part of the FBI, sinking deeper and deeper into an investigation that seemed unending, he was grateful for his cantankerous boss with the heart of a marshmallow and his sometimes rowdy, always competitive colleagues. They would be difficult people to give up.

**Author's Note:**

> I've made a list of alphabet soup agencies and rom com tropes to incorporate. The especially stupid "Pete's not actually gay" conspiracy theory will not be making an appearance, because that would ruin my OTP. Also, I don't know how any of these agencies actually work, but neither do those keyboard warriors, so who cares. Well, except for the EPA, which is more than recent EPA administrators can say. So far this thing is surprisingly serious, but that's probably because we're a way off from the love poetry yet.


End file.
